[MAN  COBWEB 


NAM  TOALE 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 


BY  THE  SAME  AUTHOR 

MANCHU  AND  MUSCOVITE 

THE  RE-SHAPING  OF  THE  FAR  EAST 

THE  TRUCE  IN  THE  EAST  AND  ITS  AFTERMATH 

INDISCREET  LETTERS  FROM  PEKING 

THE  COMING  STRUGGLE  IN  EASTERN  ASIA 

THE  FORBIDDEN  BOUNDARY  AND  OTHER  STORIES 


The  Human  Cobweb 

A  Romance  of  Peking 


BY 

B.  L.   PUTNAM    WEALE 


NEW  YORK 

DODD,  MEAD   &   COMPANY 
1910 


COPYRIGHT,  1910,  BY 
DODD,  MEAD  &  COMPANY 

Published,  January^  1910 


To  the  Memory  of 
My  Father 


257410 


BOOK   ONE 


CHAPTER  I 

"La  derniere  chose  qu'on  trouve  en  faisant  un 
ouvrage,  est  de  savoir  celle  qu'il  faut  mettre  la 
premiere." — PASCAL. 

IT  was  almost  exactly  eight  o'clock  when  the  first  guests 
reached  Mrs.  John  West's  hospitable  house,  and  it  was 
almost  exactly  a  quarter  past  before  the  last  person  had 
arrived.  It  was  significant,  in  Mrs.  John  West's  eyes,  that 
the  first  comers  should  have  been  Phyllis  May  and  her 
mother,  and  that  the  very  last  man  of  all  had  been  no  other 
than  Peter  Kerr.  Somehow,  it  at  once  attracted  her  atten- 
tion. The  significance,  it  is  true,  was  of  that  special  kind 
which  means  infinitely  more  to  a  woman  than  to  a  man; 
for  Peter  Kerr's  lateness  might  have  really  been  occasioned 
by  a  hundred  different  things  having  not  the  slightest  con- 
nection with  this  particular  dinner-party.  Certainly,  if  his 
apologies  meant  anything,  it  was  only  his  watch  which  had 
been  at  fault,  which  is  another  way  of  saying  that  he  had 
been  forgetful  or  careless. 

But  Mrs.  John  West  was  one  of  those  women  who  cling 
to  preconceived  ideas,  and  who  pay  scant  attention  to  mascu- 
line explanations.  Also  she  had  arrived  at  that  puzzling  age 
when  one  ponders  over  things  and  gives  undue  importance 
to  the  deductive  method. 

It  was  therefore  a  source  of  further  satisfaction  for  her  to 
be  able  to  note  that  Peter  Kerr  deliberately  delayed  going  up 
to  Phyllis  May  until  further  delay  had  become  impossible. 
Even  when  that  last  unfortunate  moment  had  come,  he  made 
his  greetings  with  his  habitually  easy  manner  curiously 
restrained  and  overcast  by  something  difficult  to  explain. 
A  faulty  timepiece  could  not  explain  that,  thought  Mrs. 
John  West  a  little  triumphantly  to  herself,  as  she  allowed 


COBWEB 

a  few  more  reflective  minutes  to  go  by  before  sending  her 
guests  into  dinner.  And  whilst  she  talked"  a  little  vaguely  to 
General  Shaw,  a  somewhat  taciturn  veteran  who  had  gained 
a  great  reputation  in  India  principally  by  maintaining  a 
gloomy  and  discretionary  silence  through  a  long  term  of 
years,  she  definitely  made  up  her  mind  that  Phyllis  May's 
chances  of  marrying  Peter  Kerr  had  for  some  reason  entirely 
vanished.  Mrs.  John  West  had  not  time  enough  to  try  to 
guess  what  had  suddenly  come  over  Peter  Kerr;  what 
mainly  struck  her  was  that  for  woman  to  dispose  man  must 
first  propose.  Man's  position  appeared  to  her  just  then 
singularly  superior,  and  this  unconsciously  both  piqued  and 
interested  her. 

Peter  Kerr,  however,  whatever  his  innermost  thoughts  and 
his  particular  motives  may  have  been,  was  much  too  much 
a  man  of  the  world  to  allow  it  to  be  generally  noticed  that 
subtle  changes  in  the  mental  attitudes  of  several  people  in 
the  room  had  undoubtedly  taken  place  since  his  appearance. 
For  no  sooner  were  they  all  seated  at  table  than,  as  if  con- 
scious that  he  might  be  observed,  he  launched  out  into  ani- 
mated description  of  a  new  invention  which,  if  it  were 
as  successful  as  was  anticipated,  might  once  again  revolu- 
tionize the  industrial  world.  As  he  talked,  Phyllis  May, 
who  was  on  his  right,  took  care  to  interject  frequent  remarks, 
to  show  that  she  was  highly  interested  in  a  matter  which  of 
course  greatly  bored  her.  Her  interest  was  so  pronounced 
that  Mrs.  John  West  speedily  assumed  that  she  had  reached 
the  same  conclusion  as  herself.  Mrs.  John  West  even 
began  to  wonder,  when  her  duties  as  hostess  allowed  her 
attention  to  stray  so  far,  whether  Phyllis,  as  soon  as  dinner 
was  over,  might  not  show  that  acute  concern  which  is 
expected  in  young  girls  when  they  are  grievously  disap- 
pointed. In  other  words,  Mrs.  John  West — quite  erro- 
neously— credited  Phyllis  with  a  desire  to  weep  a  little — 
which  made  the  situation  all  the  more  interesting  to  her. 

For  Phyllis  May  was  not  only  relatively  young  but  actually 
so,  and  nothing  but  circumstances  over  which  she  had  exer- 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  3 

cised  little  control  had  been  responsible  for  the  assumption 
which  had  quite  lately  grown  up  that  Peter  Kerr  would 
inevitably  marry  her.  The  assumption,  indeed,  had  been 
almost  purely  one  made  by  her  mother  and  by  a  few  intimate 
friends  like  Mrs.  John  West,  who  having  married  early 
themselves  were  quite  willing  to  believe  that  all  other  girls 
would  certainly  do  likewise — that  is,  if  they  could.  Yet 
Phyllis  herself,  since  she  was  only  eighteen,  had  been  far 
too  much  satisfied  with  the  comforts  of  life  in  London  with 
her  widowed  mother  to  wish  to  fling  impulsively  away  from 
home  with  a  man  whom  a  perfunctory  marriage  service 
would  convert  into  her  husband.  Such  an  idea  was  naturally 
foreign  to  her;  she  did  not  belong  to  the  class  of  women 
who  are  inevitably  associated  with  perambulators  and 
babies.  But  circumstances  are  generally  the  controlling 
factors  in  a  rather  lazy  and  drifting  world;  and  the  cir- 
cumstances which  had  undoubtedly  begun  unduly  to  influ- 
ence Phyllis  May  whilst  she  was  at  this  plastic  age  had 
been  that  she  was  thrown  a  good  deal  into  the  society  of 
men  who  were  both  free  and  frank,  and  who,  finding  her 
sympathetic  and  very  easy  to  talk  to,  had  confided  in  her  so 
much  that  possibly  too  quickly  she  had  believed  that  she 
must  be  an  exceptional  girl  who  would  make  her  choice  the 
very  moment  it  might  please  her  to  do  so.  Between  this  and 
actual  marriage  there  is  no  great  gulf,  as  all  those  who  are 
learned  in  the  intricacies  of  matrimony  must  admit. 

Of  all  these  men,  Peter  Kerr  had  quickly  stepped  far  in 
advance,  mainly  because  of  certain  mental  qualities  he  seemed 
to  possess.  Phyllis  May's  very  first  impression  of  him  had 
been  that  he  was  clever,  though  wayward  and  rather  diffi- 
cult to  understand.  Perhaps  it  was  that  which  attracted  her. 
He  was  also  handsome  in  a  somewhat  harsh  way,  his  features 
being  too  strong  for  a  formal,  black-coated,  silk-hatted  age. 
They  seemed  to  inform  one  continually  that  his  remote  fore- 
bears had  been  engaged  in  the  rudest  occupations;  and  that 
this,  their  far-off  descendant,  had  in  him  the  germs  of  their 
callous  savagery  and  inconvenient  resolution.  It  was  even 


4  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

said  at  his  club  that  it  required  no  very  great  stretch  of 
imagination  to  picture  Peter  Kerr  cutting  off  heads  and 
coolly  counting  them  so  as  to  make  sure  that  he  had  not  been 
defrauded  of  his  just  toll.  They  gilded  this  pill  by  adding 
that  they  meant  that  he  would  make  an  excellent  executioner 
in  an  historic  pageant.  He  would  look  the  part,  they  meant. 
That  explanation,  however,  was  an  afterthought.  The  first 
thought — like  all  first  thoughts — was  the  instinctive  one. 

Not  that  it  was  meant  thereby  that  Peter  Kerr  was  neces- 
sarily cruel  and  merciless.  Rather  was  it  implied  that  his 
character  was  such  that  if  he  put  his  hand  to  a  gruesome  job 
he  would  probably  carry  it  through  inflexibly,  with  his 
reputed  heredity  materially  assisting  him  in  the  task,  and 
indeed  showing  him,  in  some  subtle  and  inexplicable  way, 
exactly  what  to  do.  Gossip  of  this  sort  is  rather  hard  on  a 
man,  for  it  is  generally  not  founded  on  those  facts  which 
satisfy  a  Mr.  Francis  Galton,  and  if  faces  alone  told  the 
whole  truth  it  would  be  a  very  unfortunate  day  for  a  good 
many  people  in  the  world. 

Nevertheless  this  reputed  quality — and  the  fact  that  he  was 
clever  and  rather  difficult  to  understand — had  probably 
singled  him  out  more  than  anything  else  in  Phyllis  May's 
eyes;  for  one  day  some  one  had  told  her  of  the  club  saying, 
and  it  seemed  to  her  so  apposite  that  she  could  not  help 
remembering  it.  Women,  as  they  themselves  admit,  are 
curious  beings  at  the  best  of  times;  and  perhaps  there  is 
nothing  in  the  world  quite  so  hard  to  conciliate  with  men's 
rules  of  common  sense  as  the  very  young  woman  with  imag- 
ination. Desdemona's  affection  for  the  Moor  appears  in  the 
present  sophisticated  age  an  endless  puzzle.  Yet  it  was, 
after  all,  nothing  very  strange.  It  was  merely  because 
Othello  spoke  of  most  disastrous  chances  of  moving  accidents 
by  flood  and  field,  of  hairbreadth  escapes  in  the  imminent- 
deadly  breach,  that  Desdemona  saw  his  visage  only  in  his 
mind  and  was  willing  to  consecrate  her  soul  and  fortunes 
to  his  honours  and  valiant  parts.  This  is  the  same  as  saying 
that  he  infected  her  with  the  germ  of  hero-worship  (or 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  5 

battle- worship),  which  is  a  deadly  germ,  upsetting  all  laws 
and  very  dangerous  indeed.  To  the  ordinary  masculine 
mind  it  is  no  doubt  strange  that  such  things  should  exist — 
especially  when  the  hero  is  sooty-faced;  yet  doubtless  these 
strange  things  assist  to  adjust  the  general  balance  in  the 
world  and  should  not  be  too  much  decried.  Perhaps  Phyllis 
May  could  not  help  believing  that  Peter  Kerr  embodied 
certain  qualities  which  made  him  different  from  other  men 
and  essential  to  her  happiness.  Possibly  again,  idly  pur- 
suing this  line  of  thought,  she  had  sometimes  built  numbers 
of  those  extravagant  castles  which  have  no  more  solidity 
than  the  morning  vapours.  It  is  never  possible  to  know 
exactly  what  other  people  think. 

Peter  Kerr  in  the  ordinary  course  of  events  should  have 
surrendered  to  the  inevitable  ere  now;  that  is,  he  should 
have  proposed.  But  a  week  or  two  ago,  as  if  suspecting  the 
part  he  was  called  upon  to  play,  he  had  suddenly  become 
elusive,  alleging  that  he  was  so  busy  that  he  had  little  or  no 
time  for  his  friends.  It  was  exactly  for  this  reason  that 
Mrs.  John  West  had  pinned  him  down  to  this  particular 
dinner-party.  And  now,  in  the  space  of  relatively  few  min- 
utes, it  had  been  clearly  demonstrated  to  the  subtle  feminine 
mind  that  he  was  strictly  on  the  defensive  and  wished  this  to 
be  clearly  understood.  It  was  cruel  of  him,  perhaps,  but 
these  are  the  facts. 

Everything  seemed  to  favour  him.  The  conversation  at  the 
pleasant  dinner-table  for  no  good  reason  had  been  suddenly 
swept  into  an  excited  political  discussion,  making  the  prob- 
ability of  that  culminating  tete-a-tete  which  Mrs.  John  West 
had  pictured  to  herself  more  and  more  remote.  The  dinner, 
instead  of  bringing  the  two  together,  was  somehow  estrang- 
ing them  more  and  more,  and  a  keen  student  of  psychology 
would  have  realized  at  once  that  there  was  battle  rather  than 
love  in  the  air. 

It  was,  however,  the  fault  of  Fate,  not  of  man.  The  Far 
East,  though  ten  thousand  miles  away,  had  lately  communi- 
cated to  England  a  series  of  electrical  shocks  which  seemed 


6  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

to  herald  the  gravest  events.  After  a  period  of  delusive 
calm,  following  the  months  of  the  Japanese  war  with  China, 
Russia  had  quite  unexpectedly  started  the  ball  rolling  again 
in  far-off  Asia;  and  then,  when  some  rapid  diplomacy  had 
almost  checkmated  the  designs  which  Muscovite  statesmen 
showed  they  possessed,  Germany  had  suddenly  appeared  on 
the  scene,  and  by  her  promptitude  in  landing  marines  and 
seizing  a  strip  of  Chinese  territory,  as  punishment  for  the 
inopportune  massacre  of  some  of  her  missionaries,  had  justi- 
fied and  made  inevitable  further  Russian  action.  In  those 
days  it  was  not  Germany  who  was  the  enemy ;  it  was  Russia. 

It  was  this  latest  development  which  everybody  was  now 
discussing.  The  evening  papers  had  just  announced  that 
Russia,  determined  to  have  an  ice-free  port  in  the  Far  East, 
had  already  despatched  a  small  squadron  to  the  harbour  of 
Port  Arthur,  and  although  it  seemed  doubtful  how  far 
St.  Petersburg  would  actually  go  in  the  teeth  of  British 
opposition,  there  was  every  possibility  that  Port  Arthur 
would  be  forcibly  annexed  at  once  by  the  Czar's  officers. 

General  Shaw,  the  taciturn  Indian  veteran,  whose  substan- 
tial Eastern  reputation  had  been  so  largely  built  up  by  his 
discretionary  silence,  had  been  suddenly  roused  to  undip- 
lomatic and  emphatic  speech  by  the  old  Russian  spectre. 
Though  what  he  said  was  mainly  a  "warming-up"  of  things 
familiar  to  ten  million  newspaper  readers,  it  was  of  that 
stuff  which  will  never  cease  being  popular.  General  Shaw 
felt  sure  he  would  be  applauded;  for  the  English,  as  a 
nation,  because  of  certain  historical  and  geographical  reasons, 
love  to  feel  menaced  and  then  to  be  superfluously  reminded 
at  all  hours  of  the  day  and  night  that  never,  never  will  they 
be  slaves. 

"Although  I  do  not  wish  it  to  be  supposed  that  I  believe 
wholly  these  newspaper  reports,"  the  General  was  now 
announcing  in  an  oracular  manner,  "I  think  it  absolutely 
essential  that  we  should  do  something  at  the  present  juncture. 
In  India  we  know  very  well  how  these  things  are  worked. 
First  there  is  a  small  and  innocent-looking  forward  move- 


THE   HUMAN    COBWEB  7 

ment.  Then,  if  no  suspicions  have  been  openly  aroused,  the 
Russians  do  a  little  more ;  then  again  a  little  more ;  until  in 
the  end  it  does  not  matter  to  them  very  much  whether  there 
is  opposition  from  us  or  not.  That  has  happened  for  half 
a  century  in  Central  Asia  and  on  the  Persian  frontier,  and  to 
my  mind  we  are  beginning  to  skate  oh  very  thin  ice.  For- 
tunately, in  this  case,  it  is  purely  a  question  of  sea-power,  and 
we  can  undoubtedly  act  as  we  please." 

General  Shaw  ended  his  monologue  in  some  satisfaction. 
He  was  indeed  so  satisfied  both  with  his  logic  and  the  ease 
with  which  he  had  spoken,  that  he  sent  a  challenging  glance 
round  the  dinner-table,  as  if  it  were  impossible  either  to 
controvert  his  opinion  or  to  add  anything  further.  Although 
the  hum  of  approval  which  he  had  expected  now  sounded 
pleasantly  in  his  ears,  the  General  had  reckoned  without 
Peter  Kerr.  . 

"I  disagree  with  you  absolutely,  General,"  he  began,  so 
deliberately  that  Mrs.  John  West,  more  certain  than  ever 
that  he  was  in  a  combative  mood,  nodded  her  head  pointedly 
at  Phyllis  May.  Phyllis  herself  was  suddenly  impressed 
with  the  idea  that  in  some  way  this  distant  political  turmoil 
specially  interested  Peter  Kerr:  otherwise  she  felt  sure  he 
would  not  have  shown  himself  so  concerned.  In  spite  of 
herself  she  also  became  interested;  and  also,  in  spite  of  her 
resolve  not  to  do  so,  she  kept  glancing  at  his  face  as  he 
spoke.  What  was  it  ?  she  wondered. 

"In  the  first  place,"  Kerr  said,  "it  is  all  very  well  to  talk 
about  our  sea-power;  but  is  it  merely  a  question  of  sea- 
power?  I  think  not,  for  this  reason.  I  am  going  to  bore 
you  all  horribly,  but  to  demolish  the  General's  arguments 
I  must  be  long-winded.  After  the  Japanese  war  with  China 
was  concluded  two  or  three  years  ago,  you  will  all  remember 
that  three  Powers  came  to  China's  help,  and  forced  the 
Japanese  to  give  back  that  southern  portion  of  Manchuria 
on  the  coast  of  which  Port  Arthur  lies.  These  Powers  were 
Russia,  Germany,  and  France.  They  acted  strictly  in  con- 
cert three  years  ago,  and  it  is  morally  certain  that  what  is 


8  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

now  going  on  is  privately  considered  by  them  as  a  mere 
liquidation  of  a  just  debt.  That  is,  payment  is  being 
enforced  for  past  services  in  the  manner  that  is  most  pleasing 
to  these  Powers,  whether  China  happens  to  like  it  or  not. 
Germany  and  Russia  have  begun ;  France  must  follow.  The 
question  for  us  merely  is  whether  we  consider  ourselves  justi- 
fied in  risking  a  rebuff  in  a  matter  from  which  we  stood  quite 
aloof  three  years  ago.  Can  we  afford  it? — that  is  the  main 
question.  Diplomatically  and  financially  can  we  afford  it? 
And  supposing  we  can  afford  it,  is  the  game  really  worth  the 
candle?  In  any  case  there  are  other  means  available  than 
those  suggested  by  General  Shaw.  I  could  say  a  lot  more, 
but  I  only  want  to  put  my  ringer  on  the  weak  spot  in  the 
General's  argument  that  it  is  simply  and  purely  a  Russian 
question." 

"I  agree  with  you,  Kerr,"  said  a  very  serious-looking 
banker,  Sir  James  Barker.  "With  us  it  should  always  be  a 
question  of  money — a  careful  reckoning  as  to  whether  the 
game  is  worth  the  candle.  In  Europe  our  sea-power  must 
be  exerted  from  time  to  time,  at  all  costs,  but  in  Asiatic 
waters  of  no  particular  value  I  am  utterly  against  taking 
adventurous  risks.  I  am  afraid,  General,  you  have  taken 
too  much  for  granted." 

Sir  James  Barker  turned  his  solemn  face  slowly  round  from 
one  end  of  the  table  to  the  other,  much  as  a  search-light  is 
turned,  and  the  immediate  effect  was  to  make  the  General's 
allies  wonder  why  they  had  been  so  easily  convinced. 
Usually  this  sort  of  conversation,  excepting  at  the  first 
blush,  is  not  enlivening.  The  men  become  either  so  com- 
bative that  they  create  alarm,  or  else,  because  the  subject  is 
dull  and  intricate,  two  or  three  constitute  themselves  spokes- 
men and  all  others  become  unwilling  listeners.  To-night 
it  was  different.  There  was  undoubtedly  electricity  in  the 
air,  and  people  wanted  to  hear  more  of  the  subject. 

"My  dear  General,"  said  some  one  who  loved  to  bait  him, 
"your  arguments  seem  more  than  a  bit  shaky." 

General  Shaw  snorted  his  contempt.    Thoroughly  aroused, 


THE   HUMAN    COBWEB  9 

he  was  now  busy  demonstrating  to  his  end  of  the  table, 
with  the  aid  of  salt-cellars  and  knives  and  forks,  just  what 
would  happen  if  England  were  foolish  enough  to  be  guided 
by  such  opinions  as  those  just  expressed.  It  was  a  question 
concerning  all  Asia  and  not  merely  the  Far  East. 

"It  is  all  very  well  for  them  to  talk,"  he  grumbled,  "but 
Kerr  is  an  engineer  and  looks  at  things  mathematically— 
that  is,  without  political  instinct.  Barker  is  a  banker,  and 
we  all  understand  what  that  means.  I  insist  that  I  am  right. 
Why,  my  dear  madam,"  he  concluded,  turning  to  his 
hostess,  "I  have  been  in  India  for  forty  years.  Am  I  not  to 
be  believed?" 

Mrs.  John  West  nodded  sympathetically  and  allowed  the 
General  to  mount  his  favourite  hobby-horse,  whilst  secretly 
she  listened  to  what  was  going  on  at  the  other  end  of  the 
table.  Her  husband  was  trying  to  ^effect  a  compromise 
between  the  two  extreme  parties  of  peace  and  war  which  had 
suddenly  arisen,  but  he  was  not  very  successful.  Even  the 
ladies  had  taken  sides,  and  Phyllis,  in  a  sudden  spirit  of 
opposition,  added  fuel  to  the  flames  by  declaring  aloud  that 
she  thought  Peter  Kerr  was  so  thoroughly  unpatriotic  that 
he  deserved  summary  treatment.  Kerr,  though  he  affected 
to  laugh  with  everybody  else,  soon  appeared  openly  annoyed 
at  the  attention  he  had  drawn  on  himself.  Making  an  effort, 
he  now  attempted  to  pass  it  all  off  as  a  matter  of  small 
importance. 

"After  all,"  he  said,  turning  to  Phyllis,  "we  are  only 
theorizing,  and  none  of  our  forecasts  will  come  true.  The 
unexpected  will  most  certainly  happen — what  does  it  matter  ? 
Let  us  keep  our  ammunition  for  a  better  cause — don't  you 
agree?" 

Phyllis  considered  him  carefully  for  a  moment.  Phyllis 
had  remarkably  intelligent  eyes,  which  could  see  through 
most  things,  and  just  then  she  was  determined  to  see  through 
Peter  Kerr. 

"No,"  she  replied  very  soon,  "I  do  not  agree.  You  are 
very  much  in  earnest — that  is  quite  clear.  And  I  also 


io  THE   HUMAN    COBWEB 

believe,"  she  added  in  a  lower  tone,  "that  you  have  some 
special  reason  for  being  so  interested.  You  see  how  far  I 
have  got  already." 

"And  why  should  you  believe  that?" 

Peter  Kerr  spoke  almost  defiantly;  he  seemed  to  wish  to 
provoke  her.  Phyllis,  however,  only  laughed;  she  had  no 
intention  of  obliging  him  in  any  way,  since  she  only  wished 
to  satisfy  her  own  curiosity. 

"How  stupid  men  must  be,"  she  remarked.  "I  am  quite 
sure  about  your  special  reason  now.  I  wonder  what  it  is?" 

"I  wonder  you  don't  ask,"  rejoined  Peter  Kerr. 

"Ask!"  echoed  Phyllis.  "You  must  know  that  I  never 
ask  questions  of  that  sort." 

Foiled  again,  Peter  Kerr  toyed  irritably  with  a  knife  on  the 
table.  He  was  not  successful  in  his  new  role,  he  thought, 
and  he  was  wondering  how  it  was  that  he  had  lost  his  first 
advantage.  It  was  foolish  of  him  to  have  shown  the  slight- 
est interest  in  the  General's  remarks.  Yet  when  a  man  is 
interested  how  can  he  remain  silent? 

"I  wonder,"  resumed  Phyllis  reflectively,  "how  far  a  man 
who  is  really  pushed  would  go  nowadays.  Do  you  think 
men  would  do  to-day  the  things  they  did  a  few  hundred  years 
ago?" 

"Why  not?"  said  Peter  Kerr  coolly.  "That  is,  when  they 
are  not  afraid  of  a  policeman." 

"That  is  what  I  think,"  replied  Phyllis.  "The  subject 
has  always  interested  me.  You  know,"  she  continued  a 
little  maliciously,  "you  have  a  reputation  to  live  up  to.  You 
know  what  they  say  about  you?" 

He  listened  in  sudden  amusement  as  Phyllis  told  him  the 
club  story  which  had  been  retailed  to  her. 

"I  am  very  much  flattered,"  he  replied,  when  she  had 
ended.  "I  never  knew  I  had  so  much  to  live  up  to.  I 
must  try  and  act  my  part  better,  or  else  you  won't  believe 
at  all  in  me.  What  shall  I  do  now,  for  instance?  Speak, 
and  I  shall  attempt  to  gratify  you." 

Phyllis  looked  at  him  suddenly  and  then  looked  away. 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  n 

"I  might  ask  something  impossible,"  she  suggested. 

"That  alone  is  impossible,"  replied  Peter  Kerr  in  a  way 
which  flattered  her. 

To  her  annoyance  their  conversation  was  interrupted 
before  she  could  answer.  A  growing  clamour  in  the  street 
had  at  last  been  translated  into  the  hoarse  cries  of  a  number 
of  newspaper-boys  who  were  evidently  invading  this  resi- 
dential quarter  with  a  set  purpose.  Their  calls,  bellowed 
now  in  unison,  now  in  single  shouts,  soon  arrested  general 
attention.  There  was  a  buzz  of  comments  at  the  dinner- 
table.  It  was  clear  that  there  was  news  of  importance. 
Kerr  suddenly  sat  up  in  an  attitude  of  expectancy,  and 
Phyllis  saw  that  she  was  again  forgotten. 

"Throw  open  a  window  and  find  out  what  it  is,"  said 
John  West  to  the  butler,  to  gratify  every  one's  growing 
curiosity.  General  Shaw,  who  was  still  busy  insisting  on 
the  accuracy  of  his  views,  for  some  reason  suddenly  turned 
the  colour  of  a  turkey-cock,  as  if  in  apprehension  of  his 
coming  confusion.  Sir  James  Barker,  catching  sight  of  him, 
chuckled  to  himself  and  tried  to  attract  Kerr's  attention. 
The  others  showed  their  interest  in  various  mannerisms. 

The  butler  had  discreetly  unbolted  a  window  at  the  far 
end  of  the  room,  and  now  thrust  out  his  head.  Everybody 
waited  to  hear  what  it  was. 

"Beg  pardon,  sir,"  said  the  man  finally,  somewhat  con- 
fusedly, conscious  that  all  eyes  were  fixed  on  him.  "I  can't 
catch  it,  sir.  It  is  hard  to  hear,  sir.  .  .  ." 

He  was  continuing  to  murmur  vague  excuses,  when  Peter 
Kerr  suddenly  got  up,  and  with  a  look  at  Mrs.  John  West 
and  a  word  of  explanation  to  West  himself  went  to  the 
window.  His  head  had  been  outside  only  a  few  seconds 
when  he  withdrew  it.  With  a  motion  to  the  butler  to  close 
the  glass  he  came  slowly  back  to  the  table.  Phyllis  noticed 
that  his  face  had  a  singular  expression. 

"Ladies  and  gentlemen,"  he  said  with  a  satirical  little  bow, 
as  if  this  victory  amused  him,  "I  have  the  honour  to  announce 
that  according  to  the  newsboys  the  British  squadron  has 


12  THE   HUMAN    COBWEB 

definitely  withdrawn  from  Port  Arthur,  and  the  Russian 
occupation  is  now  accepted  as  a  fait  accompli." 

A  storm  of  exclamations  and  comments  greeted  this  start- 
ling piece  of  news.  Whilst  West  was  instructing  the  butler 
at  once  to  buy  copies  of  the  newspapers,  General  Shaw,  more 
purple  in  the  face  than  ever,  was  showering  adjectives 
round  the  table. 

"Monstrous,  unheard-of,  idiotic!"  he  proclaimed.  "There 
will  be  trouble,  never  fear,  never  fear."  He  continued  to 
talk  in  indignant  snatches,  as  if  the  question  had  become  a 
personal  matter,  as  if  he  had  been  insulted;  but  the  others 
were  too  busy  with  their  own  remarks  to  notice  much  what 
he  was  saying.  Peter  Kerr  had  quietly  taken  his  seat  at 
table. 

"It  is  kismet"  he  said  very  calmly  to  Phyllis  May,  breathing 
deeply.  "I  was  almost  certain  it  was  coming.  It  has  come. 
I  am  abnormally  glad." 

"I  suppose  you  will  tell  us  the  real  reason  by  and  by," 
Phyllis  replied,  feeling  that  her  advantage  had  gone. 

It  was  characteristic  of  Peter  Kerr  that  he  had  ceased  to 
listen  to  her.  He  murmured  something  vague  in  reply,  whilst 
he  looked  inquiringly  across  the  table  in  Sir  James  Barker's 
direction.  Barker  just  then  raised  his  head,  and  Phyllis 
noticed  that  the  two  men  smiled  at  each  other  significantly. 

"Ah!"  said  Phyllis  involuntarily,  loud  enough  for  Peter 
Kerr  to  hear.  He  turned  at  once. 

"I  beg  your  pardon,"  he  said. 

"Nothing,"  she  answered.  "I  was  merely  following  up  my 
trail.  I  will  soon  catch  you." 

Peter  Kerr  remained  silent.  He  was  very  busy  thinking. 
Phyllis  rapidly  ran  through  everything  she  remembered  his 
having  said  during  the  evening.  There  must  be  some  con- 
nection between  these  two  undoubted  clues — Sir  James 
Barker  and  the  retirement  of  a  British  squadron.  What 
could  it  be?  But  Mrs.  John  West  was  now  anxiously  sig- 
nalling to  her,  and  her  thread  of  thought  was  once  again 
snapped  as  she  got  up  to  go* 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  13 

Left  to  themselves  the  men  hastily  ran  over  the  telegraphic 
columns  of  the  special  editions  which  had  been  so  dramatic- 
ally announced.  There  was  evidently  no  doubt  about  the 
news  being  true;  the  Russians  had  accomplished  their  coup, 
and  the  small  British  squadron  which  had  followed  them  into 
Port  Arthur  fully  cleared  for  action,  had  steamed  away  to 
another  Chinese  harbour  in  obedience  to  direct  instructions 
from  London.  So  said  the  cables.  This  much  was  clear,  but 
as  to  what  was  going  to  follow  even  the  sapient  editors  of 
the  evening  newspapers  confessed  themselves  in  doubt. 
However,  to  help  people  to  understand  something  of  it  all 
for  themselves,  roughly-drawn  maps  of  the  Far  East,  with 
strategic  points  clearly  marked,  had  been  printed  beneath  the 
tell-tale  telegrams,  and  the  intelligent  reader,  with  this  scrap 
of  geography  thrown  at  him,  was  evidently  expected  to 
construct  his  own  theory  without  further  editorial  help. 

Peter  Kerr,  with  a  newspaper  in  his  hand,  had  soon  with- 
drawn into  a  corner  with  Sir  James  Barker,  and  was  now 
talking  rapidly  and  earnestly  whilst  the  banker  blew  clouds 
of  cigar-smoke  thoughtfully  into  the  air.  General  Shaw,  still 
nettled  at  the  manner  in  which  his  theories  and  arguments 
had  been  demolished  by  stern  fact,  had  moved  up  beside  John 
West  and  was  consoling  himself  liberally  with  port.  At 
the  same  time  he  watched  the  two  men  in  the  corner  with 
a  grim  smile.  He  was  really  much  put  out,  and  did  not 
trouble  to  conceal  it. 

"I  had  no  idea,  West,"  he  said  finally,  "that  Kerr  and  Bar- 
ker knew  each  other  so  well.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  when 
one  thinks  of  it,  their  theories  are  so  much  of  a  piece  that 
they  must  have  discussed  this  question  a  good  deal  by  them- 
selves and  formed  their  own  conclusions.  Look  at  the  way 
Kerr  is  laying  down  the  law." 

Peter  Kerr,  in  his  earnestness,  had  seized  hold  of  Sir  James 
Barker's  arm  and  was  literally  pulling  him  along  in  his  argu- 
ments. The  banker,  accustomed  to  caution  and  yet  now 
openly  elated,  was  nodding  his  head  approvingly  and  at  the 
same  time  hushing  Kerr.  A  couple  of  other  men,  who  had 


14  THE   HUMAN    COBWEB 

pushed  their  chairs  back  and  were  smoking  thoughtfully  in 
silence,  looked  up  surprised  as  Peter  Kerr,  to  clinch  his  argu- 
ment, struck  his  hand  heavily  against  the  wall. 

"That  is  the  only  way,  and  the  road  we  must  follow,"  every 
one  heard  him  say.  Then,  as  if  suddenly  conscious  that  his 
forgetfulness  in  a  room  full  of  listening  men  was  indiscreet, 
he  suddenly  laughed  and  slowly  came  back  to  the  table. 

In  the  drawing-room  Mrs.  John  West  had  seated  herself 
beside  Phyllis  May,  and  was  holding  her  hand  as  she  gos- 
siped to  her. 

"Our  friend  seems  in  a  droll  humour  to-night,"  she  said 
tentatively,  after  they  had  talked  a  little  of  other  things, 
as  she  examined  a  pretty  chain  which  hung  round  Phyllis's 
neck.  "I  have  come  to  the  conclusion,"  she  went  on,  "that 
he  is  rather  curious — in  fact,  a  good  deal  of  an  unknown 
quantity.  Don't  you  think  so,  Phyllis  dear?" 

Mrs.  John  West's  hope  that  a  confession  might  be  forth- 
coming disappeared  as  she  glanced  at  the  girl's  face. 

"Perhaps,"  rejoined  Phyllis  laconically.  Phyllis  leaned 
back  in  her  chair  and  gazed  lazily  at  her  hostess  through  half- 
closed  eyelids.  She  disliked  the  interrogative  form  of  con- 
versation very  cordially  just  now,  and  she  was  annoyed 
with  Mrs.  John  West's  attitude.  Undoubtedly  she  had  been 
nettled  at  Peter  Kerr's  general  attitude,  but  then  that  was 
her  business.  Phyllis  had  a  mind  of  her  own,  which  her 
mother  was  never  tired  of  warning  her  would  sooner  or 
later  bring  her  to  a  special  kind  of  perdition.  So,  determined 
not  to  give  the  slightest  encouragement,  she  now  began  talk- 
ing on  indifferent  subjects. 

Mrs.  John  West,  foiled  in  her  object,  hardly  listened  as  she 
looked  round  the  room.  She  too  was  thinking  about  Peter 
Kerr.  She  wondered  whether  she  had  made  a  mistake  in 
thinking  Phyllis  suitable  for  him.  Perhaps  he  was  not 
a  marrying  man.  He  had  certainly  reached  an  age  when  he 
might  be  counted  on  to  know  his  own  mind.  She  hoped  that 
he  would  not  be  irritated  with  her-— she  would  not  like 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  15 

'faat.    Mrs.  John  West  looked  critically  at  Phyllis  as  if  she 

were  measuring  her  for  a  new  gown.    Yes — she  had  evidently 

made  a  mistake.     She  was  rather  sorry  she  had  shown  so 

much  concern,  after  all. 
"I  wonder  what  has  happened  to  the  men,"  ventured  Phyllis 

at  length,  after  nearly  half  an  hour  had  elapsed.  She  had 
exhausted  nearly  every  neutral  subject  and  was  beginning 
to  feel  rather  dismal. 

"There  was  such  a  warlike  feeling  that  I  should  not  be 
surprised  if  they  began  fighting.  Perhaps  the  General  is 
leading  them  against  one  another."  Mrs.  John  West  sup- 
pressed a  yawn  as  she  glanced  at  the  clock.  "If  they  do  not 
come  soon,  I  shall  have  to  send,"  she  concluded. 

Fortunately,  the  sound  of  a  chorus  of  voices,  laughing  and 
protesting  loudly,  grew  nearer,  and  when  the  door  opened, 
in  came  West  leading  Sir  James  Barker  and  Peter  Kerr  by 
the  arm. 

"Here  are  the  two  culprits,  my  dear,"  he  said,  bringing  his 
captives  to  his  wife.  "They  were  in  a  corner  hatching  a 
dark  plot  for  hours,  and  we  could  do  nothing  with  them. 
They  would  have  remained  there  all  night,  I  believe,  if  they 
had  not  become  suspicious  about  our  ears.  Now,  Kerr,  tell 
the  truth.  What  was  it  all  about?  At  least  you  cannot 
refuse  the  ladies." 

Although  West  affected  to  laugh,  his  curiosity  had  also 
been  aroused,  and  he  was  really  quite  serious. 

"Oh,  yes,  you  will  have  to  tell,"  urged  Mrs.  John  West, 
seconding  her  husband  and  looking  persuasively  at  the 
younger  man. 

Peter  Kerr  laughed  and  glanced  at  the  banker.  Sir  James 
Barker  had  become  preternaturally  solemn.  He  looked  as  if 
he  feared  that  Kerr  might  be  persuaded  to  say  something 
indiscreet. 

"We  should  like  to  oblige  you,"  began  the  important  man, 
speaking  for  both  of  them,  "but " 

"I  will  give  them  a  clue  and  no  more,"  broke  in  Peter  Kerr, 


16  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

nudging  Barker.  "We  were  just  talking  about  steel,  nothing 
more  and  nothing  less — just  hard  steel — and  that  is  all  we 
propose  to  tell  you." 

There  was  a  disappointed  chorus.  Mrs.  John  West  tried 
to  entrap  Peter  Kerr  into  saying  more,  but  laughingly  he 
sought  safety  by  retreating  suddenly  and  leaving  it  to  Sir 
James  Barker  to  face  the  enemy.  Fate,  however,  willed  that 
he  should  walk  into  the  very  corner  of  the  room  where 
Phyllis  May  was  now  sitting  alone,  and  Phyllis  now  being 
in  a  captious  mood,  his  satisfaction  at  his  quick  retreat  was 
short-lived.  At  once  she  commenced  baiting  him. 

"What  have  I  done  to  incur  such  ruthless  hostility?"  he  in- 
quired at  length  in  aggrieved  tones.  He  looked  so  hurt 
that  Phyllis  relented  a  little. 

"You  know,"  she  said  in  her  most  engaging  manner,  "when 
you  conceal  things  from  the  inquisitive  female  mind  you  must 
expect  anything.  A  secret  drives  us  mad." 

"Look  here,"  said  Kerr  suddenly,  making  up  his  mind,  "I 
am  going  to  tell  you.  It  is  all  about  railways — railways  in 
China.  For  Heaven's  sake  tell  no  one — not  even  your 
mother — or  I  am  lost." 

Phyllis  sat  up  quickly. 

"Then,"  she  said,  "you  will  have  to  go  away — far  away?" 

Peter  Kerr  nodded  to  her  silently. 

"Oh !"  said  Phyllis,  and  that  is  all  she  said. 

When  Mrs.  John  West  managed  to  find  a  few  minutes 
to  leave  her  other  guests,  she  discovered  the  two  still  in 
the  same  corner.  Peter  Kerr  with  Phyllis  May's  fan  in  his 
hand  was  drawing  imaginary  lines  and  circles  on  the  floor, 
and  Phyllis  was  listening  to  him  in  close  attention.  The 
breach  between  the  two  had  apparently  been  healed.  Such  is 
the  contrariety  of  woman  that  Mrs.  John  West,  instead  of 
being  pleased,  was  somewhat  angry. 

"My  dear  Phyllis,"  she  said  at  once,  "we  want  you  over 
there."  She  put  out  her  hand  and  brought  the  girl  to  her 
feet.  For  a  moment  they  stood  there  hand  in  hand — Phyllis 


THE   HUMAN    COBWEB  17 

lithe  and  almost  childlike,  Mrs.  John  West  mature  and  mag- 
nificent. 

Later,  Peter  Kerr,  walking  slowly  home  and  smoking  a 
meditative  cigar,  had  a  good  deal  to  think  about.  At  inter- 
vals, when  his  mind  came  back  to  the  people  he  had  just 
left,  somehow  Phyllis  May  and  Mrs.  John  West  became 
entwined  in  a  curious  yet  fascinating  way,  as  they  had  last 
stood  together.  And  thus  entwined,  they  became  almost 
symbolical  of  something  which  finished  by  irritating  and  per- 
plexing him. 


CHAPTER  II 

"L'imagination  est  la  folle  du  logis."— VOLTAIRE, 
Dictionnaire  Philosophique. 

IT  took  some  little  time  for  the  great  English  public  to 
realize  the  meaning  of  the  political  events  which  had  taken 
place  at  the  other  end  of  the  world;  but  as  soon  as  the 
general  outlines  had  become  clear,  a  dull  and  perhaps  unrea- 
sonable anger  speedily  grew  up.  That  Russia,  the  traditional 
enemy,  should  have  so  manifestly  succeeded  in  outwitting 
England,  by  means  of  fair  promises  and  foul  play,  was  held 
disgraceful — for  that  is  what  had  happened.  It  showed — or 
seemed  to  show — that  a  new  and  extraordinary  complacency 
regarding  England's  future  in  Asia  had  arisen  in  govern- 
ment circles:  otherwise  this  particular  question  would  have 
been  very  differently  handled.  So  reasoned  the  crowd,  talk- 
ing loudly,  until  there  had  grown  up  another  popular  hallu- 
cination, rooted  in  elementary  psychosis  and  elementary 
political  feeling,  regarding  a  matter  too  full  of  contradictions 
for  the  ordinary  man  to  grasp. 

For  as  regards  understanding  the  exact  importance  of  the 
many  subtle  moves  which  had  taken  place  in  far-off  eastern 
Asia — all  of  which  were  really  intimately  connected  with  the 
Port  Arthur  incident — it  is  to  be  doubted  whether  more 
than  a  mere  handful  of  this  indignant  general  public  could 
have  expressed  themselves  really  intelligently,  in  spite  of  their 
newspapers.  But  that  was  unimportant.  It  is  by  no  means 
necessary  to  understand  in  order  to  be  angry.  Indeed,  it 
necessarily  follows  that  the  less  one  understands,  the  more 
the  anger  can  be.  In  any  case,  be  this  as  it  may,  the  impor- 
tant point  in  the  public  eye  just  then  manifestly  was  that  a 
British  squadron  had  gracefully  retired  from  a  position  of 
vantage  for  reasons  which  appeared  both  mysterious  and 


THE    HUMAN    COBWEB  19 

quixotic.  Consequently  a  rebuff  had  been  suffered  by  Eng- 
land in  a  distant  part  of  the  world  which  would  make  the 
nations  laugh  in  their  sleeves.  This  was  hurtful  to  the  racial 
pride  of  the  average  man,  since  the  average  man's  pride  of 
race  must  necessarily  consist  in  certain  vainglorious  beliefs 
regarding  his  country's  power  and  prestige.  A  great  irrita- 
tion wa?  consequently  very  generally  expressed  against  the 
methods  of  Downing  Street,  and  a  belief  soon  grew  up  that 
this  retreat  would  have  to  be  paid  for  by  fresh  humiliations. 
Men  rsked  what  was  the  use  of  having  an  expensive  navy 
and  an  equally  expensive  diplomatic  service,  if  neither  was  of 
value  in  a  sharp  and  sudden  crisis?  But  this  was  no  new 
question. 

was,  however,  as  yet  too  early  to  see  what  was  going 
to  happen  ultimately  in  the  Far  East — that  even  the  prophets 
as  well  as  those  most  discontented  willingly  admitted — and 
as  matters  moved  very  slowly  and  the  cabling  of  newspaper 
correspondents  became  gradually  less  and  less,  the  passage  of 
relatively  few  days  was  sufficient  to  leave  only  the  handful 
aforesaid  with  their  attention  really  concentrated  on  the 
problem.  It  is  indeed  impossible  at  this  stage  of  the  world's 
development  for  any  given  region  to  monopolize  attention 
for  more  than  a  few  days — unless  there  is  actual  war.  Inter- 
ests are  now  too  varied  for  that.  There  is  always  something 
fresh  in  the  morning  papers ;  and  the  adventures,  for  instance, 
of  a  courtesan  at  Monte  Carlo  must  be  dealt  with  just  as 
minutely  as  the  affairs  of  an  empire.  To  be  permanently 
interested  one  must  be  financially  interested,  for  is  it  not  in 
the  pocket  that  now  lies  the  common  touchstone  of  the 
world  ? 

Peter  Kerr  was  one  of  the  handful  whose  attention  remained 
concentrated  on  this  far-off  problem.  Immersed  in  an  un- 
ending study  of  maps  and  plans  and  books,  he  found  less 
and  less  time  for  the  society  of  his  friends.  Being  full  of 
certain  ideas,  he  was  now  bent  on  maturing  as  fully  and  as 
quickly  as  possible  a  plan  which  seemed  to  him  of  a  surpris- 
ingly original  nature — a  plan  which,  while  it  had  great  audac- 


20  THE    HUMAN   COBWE; 

ity,  was  soundly  conceived,  and  on  its  own  merits  was  quite 
capable  of  being  carried  to  a  successful  conclusion.  As  he 
was  already  a  junior  partner  in  an  eminent  firm  of  consulting 
engineers,  his  services  could  well  be  spared  from  all  other 
work;  and  so,  concentrating  himself  on  his  special  problem, 
rapidly  he  passed  from  one  stage  to  another  until  he  was  at 
last  able  to  boast  to  himself  that  he  had  worked  out,  alone 
and  unaided,  with  a  completeness  which  he  would  have  pre- 
viously thought  impossible,  a  general  scheme  which  might 
have  the  most  far-reaching  results. 

One  night,  having  satisfied  himself  that  he  had  co.nplet.ed 
as  much  of  the  work  as  was  possible  at  that  date,  he  sat 
down  and  wrote  out  messages  to  Sir  James  Barker  and  his 
associates  saying  that  at  three  o'clock  the  next  day  he  would 
meet  them  at  the  banker's  offices  and  lay  before  them  his 
whole  scheme.  Next  morning,  having  received  confirma- 
tory replies,  he  allowed  himself  practically  the  first  breathing- 
space  since  the  memorable  evening  on  which  the  newsboys 
had  announced  by  their  cries  the  possibility  of  a  dream  he 
had  long  cherished  being  turned  into  fact.  Putting  on  a 
rough  suit  and  a  soft  hat,  he  determined  to  seek  relaxation 
in  some  rapid  exercise.  In  his  anxiety  to  bring  to  a  success- 
ful conclusion  the  piece  of  work  which  he  had  set  himself 
to  accomplish,  for  a  number  of  days  he  had  hardly  done  more 
than  walk  a  few  steps.  Now  that  he  had  three  or  four  hours 
to  himself  and  no  cares  to  preoccupy  him,  he  felt  in  holiday 
mood.  He  was  eager  to  be  out ;  he  was  stiff  from  this  seden- 
tary life;  and  running  downstairs  he  was  soon  out-of- 
doors. 

Swinging  along  at  a  quick  pace,  which  gave  him  a  new  sense 
of  exhilaration  strongly  satisfying  to  his  present  mood,  he  be- 
gan instinctively  to  build  many  subsidiary  castles  in  the  air. 
If  one  did  not  please  him,  forthwith  he  demolished  it  and 
erected  another  in  its  place — for  there  are  times  when  every 
man  well  believes  that  he  is  the  architect  of  the  gods.  Even 
if  his  present  scheme  was  not  successful  in  its  entirety,  Peter 


THE   HUMAN    COBWEB  21 

Kerr  felt  convinced  that  his  premises  were  correct  and  that 
therefore  ultimately  something  would  come  of  it  all.  There 
would  be  really  nothing  wasted,  and  a  vast  experience  gained. 

His  point  of  view  was  quite  simple,  and  he  argued  soundly. 
In  England,  in  Europe,  there  was  no  field  left  at  all  for  any- 
thing save  the  improvement,  the  "betterment,"  in  the  market 
phrase,  of  something  which  had  been  rendered  out  of  date  by 
the  onward  march  of  science.  Europe  was  comparatively 
speaking  filled  up,  completed.  Thousands  of  millions  of 
money  poured  out  during  the  strenuous  nineteenth  century 
had  converted  the  white  man's  home  into  a  dwelling-ground 
filled  with  scientific  improvements.  Steam,  electricity,  steel, 
and  a  hundred  other  things  had  become  mere  commonplace 
handmaidens  serving  man  like  the  slaves  of  the  lamp  of  the 
Arabian  story-teller  and  emphasizing  his  peculiar  modern 
ascendancy.  There  was  almost  nothing  that  could  now  not 
be  done ;  it  was  the  true  age  of  miracles. 

Yet  in  Asia  it  was  quite  different.  Almost  everything  re- 
mained to  be  done;  almost  everything  cried  aloud  for  the 
hand  of  science,  which  would  regulate,  improve,  and  finally 
conquer  those  forces  of  nature  which  had  too  long  been 
permitted  to  enslave  mankind.  Immense  sums  of  money 
were  necessary  for  this  great  work — sums  which  at  first  sight 
always  seemed  grotesque  in  the  eyes  of  the  financier,  accus- 
tomed only  to  a  careful  manipulation  of  millions  in  neat 
little  piles,  and  yet  withal  sums  which  were  perfectly  sane 
and  admissible  in  the  eyes  of  the  really  scientific  engineer,  to 
whom  indeed  money  must  simply  be  so  much  rough  material 
— or  wages  for  labour — requiring  to  be  cast  in  time-abiding 
shapes,  since  money,  as  Ruskin  has  well  put  it,  is  only  a 
promise  by  the  state  for  so  much  labour.  In  India,  Peter 
Kerr  remembered,  an  engineer  friend  had  recently  told  him 
that  to  harness  the  wasted  river-waters  properly  and  to  drive 
them  over  the  length  and  breadth  of  the  country  along  a 
vast  and  really  complete  system  of  canals,  rendering  famines 
well-nigh  impossible,  a  capital  expenditure  of  at  least  four 


22  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

hundred  millions  sterling  was  necessary — an  expenditure 
which  no  government  in  the  world,  whilst  present  ideas 
were  current,  would  dare  to  face. 

That  is  to  say,  would  not  dare  just  now,  whilst  the  scien- 
tific aspect  of  these  great  problems  was  popularly  misunder- 
stood. The  engineer  was  still  a  little  doubted,  Peter  Kerr 
well  believed ;  even  in  Europe  he  had  only  obtained  his  con- 
quests piecemeal.  It  was  the  cautious  financier  who  was 
given  the  casting  vote  in  matters  where  he  should  only  be  a 
tool — a  means  for  encompassing  a  great  end.  The  engineer, 
whilst  he  was  really  only  a  builder,  still  appeared  in  the  popu- 
lar mind  as  something  of  an  iconoclast — he  threw  down  so 
many  old  idols.  This  was  the  so-called  scientific  age,  yet  the 
name  was  obviously  a  misnomer.  It  would  only  be  time  to 
speak  of  that  age  when  scientific  truths  were  so  diffused  that 
the  experts  would  not  have  to  rely  upon  the  benevolence  of 
mere  glorified  cashiers — that  is,  the  bankers — for  the  prosecu- 
tion of  their  schemes.  The  people  would  demand — would  in- 
sist on  such  schemes  being  carried  out.  It  was  still  quite  true 
to  say  that  many  essential  works,  vast  works,  which  as  soon  as 
they  were  built  would  become  productive,  were  classed  in  the 
popular  mind  with  such  vain  things  as  the  pyramids,  to  build 
a  single  one  of  which  had  required,  according  to  the  Greek 
historians,  the  labour  of  three  hundred  and  sixty  thousand 
men  during  twenty  years,  and  which  were  now  proved  to  be 
mere  useless  tombs.  Now,  with  the  resources  of  science  and 
the  world's  accumulated  wealth  to  draw  upon,  what  could 
not  an  engineer  accomplish  in  twenty  years  with  three  hun- 
dred and  sixty  thousand  men!  Of  course,  in  his  time  there 
might  only  be  one  or  two  governments  which  would  have  the 
courage  to  understand  this — for  instance,  the  Russian  gov- 
ernment, also  perhaps  the  Chinese  government — governments 
governing  hundreds  of  millions  of  people  despotically.  The 
Americans  believed  that  they  were  doing  great  things;  yet 
in  America  everything  was  done  piecemeal  and  on  a  relatively 
small  scale.  Fancy,  for  instance,  in  modern  times  paying 
for  the  labour  of  three  hundred  and  sixty  thousand  men  for 


THE   HUMAN    COBWEB  23 

twenty  years,  engaged  on  one  piece  of  work!  In  Asia  it 
would  now  mean  at  least  one  hundred  millions  sterling; 
in  Europe,  four  hundred  millions;  in  America,  six  or  seven 
hundred  millions.  These  sums  were  fantastic.  Still,  they 
were  possible.  For  instance,  spread  over  a  long  term  of 
years,  they  would  not  appear  in  the  same  light  as  a  bald 
statement  made  them  appear.  If  any  one  in  1850  had  told 
the  people  of  England  that  during  the  next  half-century  a 
thousand  millions  sterling  must  be  spent  on  the  navy,  the 
enraged  populace  would  have  possibly  lynched  the  rash 
speaker.  Yet  that  sum  had  been  spent.  Peter  Kerr,  lost  in 
a  maze  of  speculations  and  calculations,  strode  along  more 
rapidly  than  ever,  happy  that  he  could  indulge  his  mood. 

"Good-morning,  Mr.  Kerr." 

So  immersed  was  he  in  his  thoughts,  that  he  pulled  himself 
together  with  a  start,  much  as  if  he  had  jumped  back  to  earth 
from  a  great  height.  The  voice  had  indeed  sounded  to  him 
as  if  it  were  immensely  off. 

"Good-morning,"  he  said  a  little  mechanically,  as  he  felt  for 
his  hat.  Only  gradually  did  he  realize  that  it  was  Mrs.  John 
West  who  was  standing  in  front  of  him. 

"Good-morning,"  she  repeated  again;  "where  were  you 
going  at  such  a  tremendous  pace,  and  what  is  the  matter?" 

His  surprise  being  complete,  he  could  think  of  nothing  more 
intelligent  to  say  than  to  comment  on  the  pale  sunshine  which 
gave  the  sombre  London  park  a  happy  and  peaceful  air.  Cer- 
tainly he  was  not  altogether  enchanted  at  this  unexpected 
meeting;  one  can  always  have  the  earth;  one  cannot  often 
soar  far  up  into  the  clouds. 

Meanwhile  Mrs.  John  West  watched  his  discomfiture  in 
open  amusement,  which  was  mixed  with  something  he  did 
not  understand.  She  plainly  had  no  intention  of  letting  him 
go. 

"Surely  you  haven't  come  to  look  at  flowers  like  a  woman 
who  is  tired  of  shops  and  wants  fresh  air?"  she  inquired 
quizzically.  Mrs.  John  West  adjusted  a  superfluous  parasol 
and  buried  her  nose  in  a  bunch  of  violets.  She  was  obviously 


24  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

in  no  hurry.  Peter  Kerr,  now  brought  completely  to  bay, 
murmured  something  vague  and  wondered  how  he  could  get 
away.  Yet  his  eyes  noted  with  approval  that  Mrs.  John 
West  was  looking  uncommonly  well  in  a  dark  green  tailor- 
made  dress.  If  it  had  only  been  another  time 

"You  are  very  mysterious  to-day,"  said  Mrs.  John  West, 
beginning  to  walk  slowly,  and  bringing  him  perforce  along 
with  her.  "It  is  hardly  fair  to  expect  me  to  do  all  the 
talking.  Besides,"  she  went  on,  not  waiting  for  his  answer, 
"you  are  not  very  polite ;  you  have  not  yet  answered  my  first 
question  regarding  what  great  things  sent  you  here.  You  will 
admit,  I  hope,  that  a  busy  man  walking  fast  at  eleven  in  the 
morning  in  a  park  is  rather  strange." 

Peter  Kerr  was  silent  for  a  minute,  and  then  smiled.  He 
had  a  pleasant  smile — the  sort  of  smile  which  makes  women 
think  they  are  at  last  understood. 

"Not  if  the  busy  man  has  felt  the  need  of  exercise  for  days," 
he  riposted.  "Besides,  think  of  the  magnet  which  no  man 
can  withstand — woman!" 

"How  absurd  you  are,"  remarked  Mrs.  John  West,  never- 
theless accepting  the  speech  with  open  satisfaction.  Still, 
she  really  wished  to  know  what  had  brought  him  there,  and 
she  made  up  her  mind  to  find  out.  Although  she  had  known 
Peter  Kerr  for  some  time,  it  had  so  happened  that  she  had 
never  got  much  beyond  a  rather  conventional  intercourse  with 
him.  He  was  one  of  many  who  sometimes  dined  with  her, 
and  who  met  her  often  elsewhere.  Though  he  could  make 
himself  decidedly  interesting  if  the  humour  seized  him,  noth- 
ing had  caused  him  to  become  detached  from  this  indifferent 
crowd — to  stand  forth  on  any  special  eminence.  Perhaps  this 
is  why  she  had  thought  that  he  would  be  a  good  match  for 
somebody  else.  One  can  always  be  generous  about  things 
that  do  not  acutely  interest  one.  But  since  the  memorable 
evening  when  both  Phyllis  and  he  had  shown  new  possibili- 
ties, Mrs.  John  West  had  somewhat  changed  her  point  of 
view.  Why  she  had  done  so  is  rather  hard  to  explain,  since 
all  sorts  of  things  continually  mould  and  remould  a  woman's 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  25 

attitude.  In  any  case,  Peter  Kerr  now  appeared  to  her  in  a 
somewhat  new  light;  and  this  being  so,  it  interested  her  to 
make  experiments  with  him. 

Their  slow  walk  had  at  length  brought  them  to  a  bench; 
Mrs.  John  West  glanced  round  and  suddenly  stopped. 

"Let  us  sit  down  for  a  bit,"  she  said,  "unless  I  really  stopped 
you  as  you  were  rushing  headlong  to  some  important  goal." 

Peter  Kerr  pulled  out  his  watch  and  smiled  again.  It  was 
impossible  to  say  what  his  smile  might  mean. 

"There  is  an  important  goal,"  he  confessed  at  length,  a  little 
reluctantly,  as  he  looked  up  at  her,  "but  I  have  two  whole 
hours  to  waste  before  I  need  reach  it.  Therefore  with  the 
greatest  pleasure  I  will  sit  down." 

"You  are  not  very  consequential  or  logical  in  spite  of  your 
deliberations,"  she  rejoined  as  she  made  room  for  him.  "First 
you  show  a  blank,  speechless  astonishment  at  seeing  me ;  then 
you  assure  me  that  I  was  the  magnet  which  drew  you  here; 
and  lastly  you  look  at  your  watch  and  confess — reluctantly — 
that  you  have  two  hours  to  waste  before  you  reach  your  goal. 
The  case  against  you  is  complete,  you  see,"  she  concluded,  as 
she  examined  her  violets.  "What  is  your  defence?" 

Peter  Kerr  laughed.  He  wondered  to  himself  whether  it 
would  be  wise  to  be  quite  frank. 

"I  have  no  defence;  the  prisoner  throws  himself  on  the 
mercy  of  the  court." 

Mrs.  John  West  had  singled  out  a  small  cluster  of  flowers 
from  her  violets  and  now  suddenly  turned. 

"I  knew  my  suspicions  were  correct,"  she  said.  "Still,  I 
will  reward  you — or  rather,  commute  your  punishment  in  a 
way  you  certainly  do  not  deserve.  I  am  going  to  encourage 
you  to  tell  me  more." 

Mrs.  John  West's  voice  was  unusually  soft.  It  has  already 
been  written  that  a  buttonhole,  carefully  inserted  by  an 
attractive  woman,  has  often  been  the  beginning  of  many  fate- 
ful things.  Peter  Kerr,  caught  by  a  sudden  train  of  thought, 
watched  the  operation  with  sudden  interest.  It  was  very 
pleasant  after  his  hard  work  to  trifle  like  this;  he  was  not 


26  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

sorry  that  his  buttonhole  was  proving  highly  unreasonable, 
and  he  wondered  how  long  it  would  last. 

Just  then,  however,  Mrs.  John  West  completed  her  task, 
and  with  a  little  sigh  she  let  her  hands  drop.  Perhaps  it  was 
not  entirely  the  stubborn  buttonhole  which  was  responsible 
for  the  colour  in  her  cheeks. 

"I  declare,"  she  exclaimed  inconsequentially,  "we  are  both 
very  foolish  this  morning — sitting  on  this  bench  and  frittering 
the  time  away.  I  wonder  what  people  would  think  if  they 
saw  us  here." 

"Why  do  people  always  bother  about  what  other  people 
think?"  remonstrated  Kerr. 

"It  is  you,  however,  who  are  morally  responsible,"  Mrs. 
John  West  went  on,  leaving  his  question  unanswered  and 
tracing  a  design  on  the  ground  with  the  tip  of  her  parasol. 
"For  it  is  quite  plain  that  if  you  had  not  turned  up  I  should 
now  be  gazing  at  the  flower-beds,  or  doing  something  equally 
simple-minded.  Whereas  now " 

"Whereas  now,"  echoed  Peter  Kerr,  "pray  go  on  to  the  end 
of  the  chapter."  He  wondered  what  she  would  say,  for  he 
had  become  quite  reconciled  to  sitting  down,  and  had  lost  all 
memory  of  his  first  irritation. 

"How  inquisitive  you  are,"  returned  Mrs.  John  West.  "I 
am  sure  I  don't  know  what  I  was  going  to  say,  and  even  if  I 
did  I  might  not  say  it."  She  stopped,  looked  at  him — then 
smiled  and  shrugged  her  shoulders. 

"That  is  too  bad,"  murmured  Peter  Kerr,  openly  disap- 
pointed; "I  thought  at  least  that  you  might  talk  to  me  in 
parables.  Yet  when  you  are  about  to  become  really  interest- 
ing you  stop  dead — you  baulk — like  a  hunter  that  refuses. 
It  is  aggravating,  even,"  he  continued,  half  to  himself.  "I 
believe  I  would  like  to  see  you  jump  at  something  bad." 

Mrs.  John  West  laughed  easily. 

"An  unwilling  horse — and  a  mare  at  that — you  know, 
should  never  be  forced.  She  should  be  coaxed." 

"I  disagree,"  said  Peter  Kerr  severely.  He  spoke  in  such 
a  way  that  she  could  not  be  certain  whether  he  was  adhering 


THE   HUMAN    COBWEB  27 

to  the  same  figure  of  speech.  "I  myself  believe  in  the  whip, 
sometimes." 

"Ah!"  said  Mrs.  West,  a  little  vaguely.  Instinctively  her 
mind  recurred  to  what  had  been  constantly  said  about  Peter 
Kerr's  disposition.  She  studied  his  profile  furtively  as  he 
looked  away,  and  she  wondered  what  sort  of  man  he  really 
was.  Why  had  he  said  that? 

"The  whip,  you  must  remember,"  she  said  aloud,  as  if  she 
had  been  only  reflecting  on  what  he  had  said,  "invariably 
produces  one  result:  it  breeds  viciousness." 

Peter  Kerr  turned  round. 

"Either  that  is  very  subtle,"  he  said,  "or  else " 

"Or  else,"  repeated  Mrs.  John  West  curiously. 

"Or  else,"  he  concluded,  "it  is  just  metaphorical." 

Mrs.  John  West  looked  so  plainly  disappointed  that  Peter 
Kerr  laughed  cheerfully.  It  seemed  to  him  that  things  might 
become  amusing  just  because  each  could  not  quite  decide 
about  the  other. 

"It  is  your  own  fault,"  he  explained,  stabbing  the  ground 
with  his  stick.  "I  have  only  borrowed  your  method.  If  you 
had  not  taught  it  to  me,  I  should  not  be  so  elusive  this  peace- 
ful morning.  I  dare  say,  even,  that  I  should  be  blunt." 

He  paused  and  observed  his  companion.  She  too  was 
making  holes  in  the  ground  with  her  parasol  point.  The 
situation  had  not  advanced  at  all.  She  had  stopped  him  in 
his  rapid  walk;  she  had  shown  herself  most  pleasant  and 
trifling;  he  had  not  been  serious  in  return.  Perhaps  it  was 
that  which  annoyed  her. 

"You  have  suddenly  become  very  silent,"  he  said  encour- 
agingly. "You  brought  yourself  to  a  jump;  you  baulked;  I 
suggested  the  whip;  you  alleged  that  it  would  only  make 
you  vicious." 

"Never  be  sure  of  a  woman,"  she  replied,  seizing  the  open- 
ing. "Or  else — and  please  observe  that  this  time  I  am  fol- 
lowing your  alleged  method  and  finishing  bluntly — you  may 
be  badly  disappointed.  Yes,  my  friend,"  she  repeated  with 
reflective  emphasis,  "badly  disappointed,  I  warn  you." 


28  THE  HUMAN   COBWEB 

Peter  Kerr,  nothing  dismayed  at  the  warning,  glanced  at 
his  companion  in  secret  amusement.  He  had  followed  her 
thoughts  without  difficulty,  and  knew  exactly  why  she  had 
changed  her  tone. 

"Why  have  you  become  so  ominous?"  he  inquired.  "There 
is  no  real  reason  why  a  woman  should  be  more  disappointing 
to  a  man  than  a  man  to  a  woman.  It  is  only  a  popular 
fiction,  I  believe.  The  weaker  vessel  is  only  weaker  in  one 
sense.  In  another  she  is  certainly  much  stronger,  and  that 
is  most  noticeable  where  man  is  concerned.  Therefore  it 
follows  from  that  that  so  far  from  being  disappointing  she 
is  exactly  the  reverse." 

"You  seem  to  know  us  very  well,"  interjected  Mrs.  John 
West,  avoiding  further  argument,  "for  a  man  of — how 
much?" 

"Of  thirty-four  and  four  months  exactly,"  Peter  Kerr 
filled  in. 

"That  is  strange,"  she  rejoined  pensively.  "You  are  then 
exactly  one  year  younger  than  I  am." 

"What  singular  good  luck — I  mean  that  we  are  both  so 
young.  We  have  thus  both  of  us  at  least  a  few  more 
years  to  run  before  the  grand  climacteric  of  the  French 
cynic." 

She  looked  up,  a  little  puzzled. 

"  'After  forty,  women  tire  of  being  moral  and  men  of  being 
honest,'  "  quoted  Peter  Kerr. 

"Oh,  that!"  rejoined  Mrs.  John  West  with  a  shrug  of  in- 
difference. "That  is  surely  out-of-date.  All  age-limits  have 
long  ago  been  abolished :  such  things  belong  to  a  less  sophisti- 
cated century.  I  am  sure  that  in  five  years  I  shall  not  feel 
the  slightest  bit  differently  from  what  I  do  to-day." 

Peter  Kerr  observed  that  Mrs.  John  West's  eyes  were  quite 
serious  now.  Something  prompted  him  to  make  a  similar 
confession. 

"I  can  certainly  conceive  of  circumstances,"  he  said  slowly, 
"when  a  man  of  thirty-four  would  do  most  things  rather 
more  thoroughly  than  any  man  of  forty.  It  might  be  neces- 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  29 

sary — absolutely  necessary — and,  as  we  are  taught  even  at 
school,  necessity  knows  no  law.  Also,  being  physically  more 
active  at  thirty-four  than  at  forty,  one  should  be  much  more 
daring.  I  have  never  really  understood  why  that  particular 
age  should  have  been  singled  out.  It  was  a  little  simple- 
minded  on  the  part  of  the  cynic,  I  am  afraid.  /  should  have 
made  the  age  thirty." 

"The  hour  for  confidence  has  manifestly  arrived,"  laughed 
Mrs.  John  West,  regaining  her  first  mood;  "you  speak  as 
if  you  were  contemplating  robbing  a  bank !" 

"Well,  perhaps  I  do,"  confessed  Peter  Kerr,  instinctively 
thinking  of  his  scheme. 

After  this  they  began  talking  more  easily,  and  a  solemn 
policeman  who  passed  presently  went  his  way  with  an  amused 
look  on  his  face.  Mrs.  John  West  was  enjoying  herself,  for 
she  was  being  entertained;  and  in  her  enjoyment  she  forgot 
to  ask  Peter  Kerr  the  many  questions  she  had  in  her  mind. 
Though  she  had  the  power  and  means  to  do  most  things  that 
took  her  fancy,  she  was  seldom  entirely  happy,  for  much  ad- 
miration and  little  love  is  really  a  diet  as  unsatisfying  to  the 
soul  as  much  drink  and  little  food  is  to  the  body.  This  Mrs. 
John  West  had  realized  some  time  ago.  There  was  the 
estimable  John  West,  of  course,  but  her  marriage  with  him 
was  a  somewhat  longstanding  affair,  and  in  any  case  John 
West  was  now  so  wholly  absorbed  in  the  money-markets 
that  he  had  scant  time  for  his  wife.  Mrs.  John  West  was 
a  fair  representative  of  the  great  modern  problem — the  prob- 
lem of  the  rich  wife  who  was  not  married  yesterday,  and 
who  somehow  finds  less  and  less  to  do  and  interest  her  from 
year  to  year.  It  is  a  problem  which  is  considered  shocking 
when  it  should  only  be  considered  serious;  it  is  a  problem 
which  is  the  fault  of  every  one  and  the  fault  of  no  one; 
it  is  a  problem  which  will  never  be  solved  and  therefore 
which  will  ever  be  considered;  it  is  a  problem  which  begins 
in  maturity  and  ends  only  in — old  age. 

So  it  happened  that  Mrs.  John  West  made  herself  so  inter- 
esting that  it  was  the  merest  chance  which  caused  Peter 


30  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

Kerr's  hands  at  length  to  steal  to  his  waistcoat  and  seek 
his  watch. 

"By  Jove!"  he  exclaimed  suddenly  under  his  breath  as  he 
realized  the  hour. 

"What  is  it?"  inquired  his  companion  anxiously. 

"Pardon  me,"  he  said,  getting  up  quickly,  "but  the  minutes 
have  literally  flown.  You  have  conjured  them  away.  Do  you 
know  that  it  is  already  past  half-past  one  ?  I  am  now  in  the 
odd  predicament  that  I  have  one  hour  and  twenty  minutes  to 
get  home ;  to  lunch ;  to  gather  a  mass  of  papers  together ;  and 
finally  to  go  three  miles  to  settle  the  most  important  business 
I  have  ever  settled." 

"Heavens!"  exclaimed  Mrs.  John  West,  now  quite  serious, 
"can  you  do  it?" 

"I  shall  try,"  he  replied. 

Mrs.  John  West  put  out  her  hand. 

"Do  not  wait — fly,"  she  said  with  an  encouraging  smile; 
"and,"  she  called  after  him,  "tell  me  all  about  it  when  next 
we  meet." 

Peter  Kerr  almost  ran,  whilst  Mrs.  John  West  walked 
very  slowly  in  the  direction  of  her  carriage.  She  was  think- 
ing a  good  deal. 


CHAPTER  III 

"Les    Angloys    s'amusent    moult    tristeraent." 

Anglo-Norman  Saying. 

THE  bank  over  which  Sir  James  Barker  presided  was  not 
housed  in  one  of  those  impressive  buildings  which  at  once 
convey  to  the  stranger  a  sense  of  the  mightiness  of  capital. 
Indeed,  since  the  bank  was  more  concerned  with  foreign  than 
with  domestic  business,  the  directorate  had  never  deemed  it 
necessary  to  give  much  thought  to  outward  appearances,  and 
consequently  their  affairs  had  grown  vastly  during  two 
strenuous  decades  without  any  corresponding  change  in 
their  premises.  The  natural  result  was  that  any  wayfarer 
who  might  stop  and  glance  casually  through  the  outer  doors 
of  the  establishment  at  the  somewhat  narrow  space  given  up 
to  the  public  counters  would  certainly  carry  away  a  totally 
false  view  of  the  resources  of  this  institution — resources 
which  had  frankly  astonished  the  staid  world  of  Lombard 
Street  in  the  particular  instance  of  the  launching  of  an 
ill-timed  but  essential  South  American  Loan,  which  had 
fallen  quite  flat  on  the  market  and  had  therefore  placed  on 
the  bank  the  onus  of  finding  at  a  few  days'  notice  the  major 
part  of  six  millions  sterling.  Sir  James  Barker  had  managed 
to  do  that  in  a  way  which  had  certainly  enhanced  his  repu- 
tation as  an  underwriter;  for  although  it  was  generally 
known  that  he  had  the  most  intimate  relations  with  some 
of  the  great  Paris  banks,  not  even  Lombard  Street  had  sus- 
pected that  on  a  tight  market  he  could  draw  with  such 
rapidity  and  ease  on  resources  possessing  an  historic  and 
well-deserved  reputation. 

The  consequence  was  that  on  the  Thursday  afternoon  in 
question,  though  there  remained  a  great  deal  of  business  to 
he  settled  that  day,  the  small  group  who  had  interested 


32  THE   HUMAN    COBWEB 

themselves  in  the  outlines  of  the  scheme  drawn  up  by  Peter 
Kerr  found  it  convenient  to  be  at  the  bank  punctually  at 
three  o'clock.  They  knew  that  Sir  James  Barker  had  a 
peculiar  flair,  or  instinct,  for  discovering  new  and  profitable 
fields  of  enterprise.  Furthermore,  it  was  admitted  that  his 
large  and  varied  relations  with  all  the  great  money-markets 
of  the  world  allowed  him  nearly  always  to  secure  himself 
against  loss  by  a  clever  pooling  of  his  interests  with  those 
of  business  rivals  whenever  an  independent  victory  had 
become  impossible.  *  Twice  he  had  done  this  with  remarkable 
skill  when  everything  was  against  him.  There  was  nothing, 
indeed,  in  the  strategy  and  tactics  of  international  capitalistic 
warfare  which  was  not  as  familiar  to  him  as  his  A  B  C,  and 
he  was  consequently  a  man  who  could  enlist  co-operation 
almost  everywhere. 

It  was  consequently  a  matter  of  surprise  and  annoyance  to 
Sir  James  Barker  when  at  least  ten  minutes  passed  by  in 
fitful  conversation  before  there  was  any  sign  of  Peter  Kerr, 
though  the  hour  of  meeting  had  arrived.  It  was  one  of 
those  moments  when  any  cooling  of  the  hot  iron  is  manifestly 
unfortunate,  since  eagerness  is  the  essential  condition  of  the 
successful  schemer;  and  therefore  the  banker  frowningly 
looked  at  the  clock  and  wondered  what  could  have  happened. 
He  had  special  reasons  for  wishing  prompt  action:  he  had 
received  warnings  that  the  field  would  not  be  clear  for  very 
long. 

A  spatter  of  horse's  hoofs,  ringing  sharply  above  the  hum  of 
the  busy  street,  apprised  him  that  the  situation  had  been 
fortunately  saved  before  it  was  too  late ;  and  an  instant  later, 
Peter  Kerr,  now  clad  immaculately,  and  carrying  a  great 
stack  of  papers  under  both  arms,  entered  the  room  rapidly 
and  expressed  many  apologies  for  the  inconvenience  he  had 
caused.  As  he  took  out  and  pointed  to  his  watch  as  the 
real  culprit,  Sir  James  Barker — for  an  instant — had  a  vague 
recollection  that  he  had  seen  him  do  much  the  same  thing 
before.  He  wondered  whether  this  was  a  constitutional 
failing  of  Kerr's.  It  was  strange  to  associate  a  lack  of 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  33 

exactitude  with  a  man  at  the  top  of  his  profession.  Still, 
it  might  be  a  little-suspected  fault.  The  big  banker  had  a 
thought  at  the  back  of  his  head  which  he  could  not  quite  get 
at  just  then. 

Sir  James  Barker's  reflections  were  cut  short  by  Peter 
Kerr's  movements.  Rapidly  he  hung  several  maps  and 
enormous  plans  over  some  other  maps  which  lined  the  walls 
of  the  directorial  sanctum;  and  then,  smoothing  out  his 
papers  in  front  of  him,  he  begged  for  half  an  hour's  careful 
attention  whilst  he  went  over  the  main  details  of  the 
scheme  which  he  had  to  explain  to  them.  Sir  James  Barker's 
friends  had  already  distributed  themselves  in  such  fashion 
as  to  be  able  to  follow  his  remarks  and  his  explanations  on 
the  maps  and  plans ;  nothing  remained  but  to  begin  promptly. 

Kerr  opened  the  meeting  by  explaining  rapidly  some  neces- 
sary points  which  he  wished  to  be  properly  understood 
regarding  the  extension  of  the  Indian  railway  system  and  the 
results  this  had  had  both  for  the  Indian  government  and 
for  the  financiers  who  had  interested  themselves  in  creating 
a  network  of  lines  which  now  measured  no  less  than  22,000 
miles  of  railway.  It  was  necessary  to  draw  this  parallel,  he 
said,  for  a  large  number  of  reasons.  In  India,  the  initial 
difficulties  to  be  overcome  had  been  of  quite  a  different 
nature  to  those  he  would  soon  be  referring  to  in  the  case  in 
China,  but  still,  though  different,  they  were  in  a  sense  allied 
to  the  problem  he  must  solve ;  and  if  the  results  of  a  number 
of  years'  working  had  been  somewhat  unsatisfactory  for 
the  great  British  Dependency,  it  was  because  the  methods 
followed  there  were  rather  primitive.  In  the  first  place, 
though  in  India  over-capitalization  was  a  sin  which  had  been 
guarded  against,  it  would  have  been  better  and  cheaper  to 
have  boldly  adopted  a  uniform  system  at  once  at  all  costs 
in  place  of  the  mixed  system  with  various  gauges  and  with 
the  poor  and  conflicting  control  such  as  now  existed.  As 
they  were  all  well  aware,  in  India  there  were  state  lines  built 
and  worked  by  the  state;  other  lines  built  by  the  state  but 
worked  by  companies;  a  third  class  QJ;  railways  both  built 


34  THE  HUMAN  COBWEB 

and  worked  by  so-called  guaranteed  companies;  again,  other 
railways  buflt  by  semi-independent  companies;  and,  apart 
from  these,  in  the  native  states  there  were  thousands  of 
miles  of  lines  operated  on  three  or  four  different  systems. 
All  sorts  of  government  restrictions  also  existed — restrictions 
which  still  further  complicated  a  very  intricate  problem. 
The  result  roughly  was  that  although  22,000  miles  of  rail- 
way had  only  apparently  cost  three  thousand  million  rupees 
or  some  £200,000,000  sterling — not  a  very  excessive  expendi- 
ture, amounting,  as  it  did,  to  only  some  £9,000  per  mile — 
the  average  net  return  on  the  capital  invested  in  a  vast  and 
rich  country  even  now  was  only  between  four  and  a  half 
and  five  per  cent.,  which,  bearing  in  mind  the  fact  that  much 
of  the  system  was  poor  and  antiquated  and  would  have  to  be 
modernized  sooner  or  later,  and  that  betterments  had  been 
hitherto  indulged  in,  was  highly  unsatisfactory.  In  Eng- 
land, he  would  remind  them,  where  they  had  over-capitalized 
their  railways  to  a  very  dangerous  extent,  the  figure  of  the 
gross  annual  earning  was  approximately  one  hundred  millions 
sterling,  leaving  a  net  earning  of  more  than  four  per  cent,  on 
the  eleven  hundred  and  fifty  millions  invested.  This  home 
result  was  therefore  far  more  happy  than  the  Indian  result, 
though  the  reverse  would  have  been  the  case  had  India's 
real  interests  been  properly  safeguarded  by  a  bold  and 
scientific  government  policy. 

Now  the  scheme  he  proposed  to  lay  before  them  as  a  prac- 
tical and  sound  scheme  was  one  to  which  he  had  given  the 
name  provisionally  of  the  Linked  Chinese  Trunk  Lines.  It 
was  designed  to  save  China  from  having  her  railway  affairs 
fall  into  the  confusion  of  the  Indian  railways.  As  they  well 
knew,  developments  had  lately  taken  place  in  the  Far  East 
of  a  very  remarkable  nature,  and  though  it  was  far  from 
clear  whether  Russia  and  Germany  were  really  acting  in 
concert  with  each  other,  as  had  been  generally  surmised,  the 
latest  reports  forecasted  that  conventions  would  soon  be 
extorted  from  China  practically  ceding  the  entire  Port 
Arthur  territory  to  Russia  and  the  Kiaochow  territory  to 


THE   HUMAN  COBWEB  35 

Germany.  He  was  not  so  much  concerned  with  these  ter- 
ritorial acquisitions  as  he  was  with  something  else.  From 
early  information  he  had  received,  he  was  certain  that 
behind  the  acquisition  of  these  naval  ports,  together  with  the 
adjoining  hinterland,  lay  great  railway  schemes;  in  fact, 
so  far  as  Russia  was  concerned  they  had  not  only  that 
curious  document,  the  so-called  Cassini  Convention,  which 
had  shown  how  much  importance  Russia  attached  to 
railway  power  in  the  Far  East,  but  they  had  now  copies  of 
the  Manchurian  Railway  Convention — an  instrument  which 
conceded  to  Russia  the  unqualified  right  to  traverse  Man- 
churia from  west  to  east  with  a  broad-gauge  railway  leading 
from  the  Baikal  provinces  into  the  Pacific  stronghold  of 
Vladivostock.  This  meant  the  building  of  more  than  a 
thousand  miles  of  Russian  railways  within  the  limits  of 
Chinese  territory.  It  was  certain  that  as  soon  as  Russia 
began  the  construction  of  this  line,  she  would  equally  demand 
the  right  to  connect  the  harbour  of  Port  Arthur  with  this 
new  system;  otherwise  Port  Arthur  would  have  little 
strategic  value.  In  other  words,  as  soon  as  a  new  conven- 
tion with  China  was  signed,  Port  Arthur  would  be  brought 
as  speedily  as  possible  into  direct  railway  communication 
with  St.  Petersburg;  and  what  Russia  did  Germany  would 
try  to  imitate  as  closely  as  possible. 

In  other  words,  a  railway  scramble  had  already  begun  in 
the  Chinese  Empire,  and  it  was  imperative  that  British 
interests,  instead  of  pausing  helplessly  and  wondering  what 
had  really  prompted  the  government  to  give  way  over  the 
Port  Arthur  question,  plunged  at  once  into  the  fray  and 
made  the  best  of  an  intricate  situation.  He  had  on  the 
table  twelve  sets  of  his  completed  scheme,  which  in  his 
belief  might  do  for  England  what  Russia  was  doing  for 
herself.  This  scheme  was  briefly:  first,  to  build  one  grand 
trunk  line  from  the  capital  Peking  to  Canton;  then  to 
continue  it  so  as  to  meet  a  light  railway  which  would  run 
from  Hankow — the  main  city  on  the  great  Yang-tse  River — 
through  the  two  provinces  of  Sze-chuen  and  Yun-nan  into 


36  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

Burmah.  These  two  combined  lines  would  measure  3,500 
miles  and  would  unite  British  territory  in  the  south  per- 
manently with  the  Chinese  Empire.  In  addition  there  must 
be  a  second  trunk  line  leading  from  Tientsin — the  great 
trading  mart  of  the  north — directly  to  Shanghai,  and  then 
running  along  the  banks  of  the  Yang-tse  to  Hankow.  This 
system,  with  its  feeders,  duly  provided  for  in  his  plans, 
would  measure  another  2,000  miles.  Combined  with  these 
main  lines  would  be  seventeen  additional  feeder  lines  meas- 
uring 1,000  miles  more  of  track.  These  6,500  miles  of  rail- 
way would  virtually  secure  England  in  China  in  a  way  no 
diplomatic  agreements  could,  for  no  concession  would  be 
asked  for  save  a  building-concession — each  length  of  rail- 
way being  surrendered  to  Chinese  control  as  soon  as  con- 
struction was  completed,  the  Syndicate  relying  entirely  on 
the  good  faith  and  unimpeachable  credit  of  the  Chinese  gov- 
ernment for  the  safeguarding  of  their  interests  and  capital. 
This  action  could  only  have  one  result — it  would  bind  China 
firmly  to  English  interests,  and  the  greater  the  pressure  of 
other  nations,  the  more  would  China  necessarily  lean  on 
England. 

Peter  Kerr  paused  for  a  minute,  to  answer  some  questions, 
before  he  quickly  plunged  into  a  further  maze  of  details, 
financial,  technical,  and  diplomatic.  As  he  talked  he  passed 
sheet  after  sheet  of  estimates  and  figures  round  the  table, 
illustrating  what  he  said  by  giving  explanations  regarding 
the  maps  and  plans  on  the  wall  behind  him  and  then  coming 
back  to  the  point  and  tracing  each  step  with  remarkable 
lucidity.  At  last  he  stopped  and  dropped  into  his  chair. 

"That,  gentlemen,"  he  finished,  "is  my  scheme.  Virtually 
it  is  the  railway  conquest  of  China  by  common-sense 
methods." 

The  voices  of  the  half-dozen  men  present  rose  at  once  in  an 
animated  discussion.  Sir  James  Barker,  looking  round  the 
room,  thought  a  unanimous  vote  of  approval  of  the  scheme 
certain  until  his  eyes  lighted  on  Mr.  Charles  Marten's  face. 
Mr.  Charles  Marten  was  the  London  head  of  the  important 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  37 

Oriental  Corporation,  a  concern  which  had  the  most  inti- 
mate relations  not  only  with  China  but  in  fact  with  all  the 
Far  East.  In  a  way  his  support  was  essential.  Sir  James 
Barker  was  puzzled  at  his  attitude.  Already  this  gentleman 
was  shaking  his  head  disapprovingly. 

"What  is  it,  Marten?"  he  said  genially.  "You  don't 
seem  to  agree.  As  you  know  a  good  deal  more  about  China 
than  we  do,  give  us  your  opinion." 

Marten,  a  little  doubtful  how  to  act  best  for  interests 
desirous  of  retaining  their  virtual  monopoly  in  the  Far  East, 
hesitated  a  minute,  and  then  got  up  and  walked  across  to 
where  an  ordinary  large-scale  map  of  China  was  hanging. 

"Well,  you  see,"  he  began  jerkily,  "although  I  am,  of 
course,  anxious  to  help  along  anything  of  this  nature  I  can, 
the  fact  is  this  scheme  seems  too  big  to  me;  it  covers  too 
much  country  and  would  therefore  not  be  acceptable  either 
to  the  Chinese  authorities  or  to  our  own  people.  Even 
assuming  that  Kerr's  figures  are  correct,  and  that  the  lines 
could  be  built  as  cheaply  as  he  has  estimated — a  thing  which 
I  very  much  doubt — there  is  a  matter  of  considerably  more 
than  fifty  millions  sterling  involved.  I  doubt  whether  that 
sum  could  be  raised,  considering  the  position  in  the  Far 
East,  from  our  public  during  the  next  few  years,  even  on 
the  most  favourable  terms.  Besides  that  there  is  the  main 
question  of  the  Chinese  approval.  I  believe  the  whole 
scheme  would  frighten  the  Peking  government  from  the 
very  start.  Our  enemies,  if  they  got  wind  of  it,  as  they  most 
certainly  would,  sooner  or  later,  could  easily  show  the 
Chinese  how  we  meant  to  gobble  up  their  country  and  make 
another  India  of  it.  The  mandarins  believe  anything — when 
it  suits  them — and  some  lines,  especially  that  line  into 
Burmah,  would  frighten  them  just  from  seeing  it  on  the 
map  in  thick  red  the  way  Kerr  has  filled  it  in.  I  think, 
therefore,  that  a  smaller  scheme,  a  considerably  smaller 
scheme,  would  be  better.  And  whilst  on  this  subject,  I  may 
tell  you  that  my  own  people  and  our  friends  of  the  Indian 
Commercial  Bank,  who  have  also  large  China  interests,  have 


38  THE    HUMAN. COBWEB 

already  taken  some  preliminary  action."  And  with  that  Mr. 
Marten  concluded  abruptly,  as  if  in  doubt  whether  he  ought 
to  say  any  more. 

Kerr,  who  had  listened  to  this  with  considerable  irrita- 
tion, now  picked  up  a  pencil  and  wrote  something  on  a  scrap 
of  paper,  which  he  passed  across  to  Sir  James  Barker. 
Marten  flushed  with  anger  as  he  saw  the  action,  and  slowly 
walked  from  the  map  back  to  the  table.  The  others,  sud- 
denly conscious  that  a  duel  had  commenced,  drew  themselves 
up  in  their  chairs  and  keenly  watched  the  protagonists. 

"What  do  you  understand,  Kerr?"  said  Marten  at  length, 
with  great  deliberation,  as  if  he  had  been  considering  Kerr's 
action. 

Peter  Kerr,  before  answering,  glanced  across  to  Sir  James 
Barker,  who  frowningly  still  held  the  scrap  in  his  hand. 
The  big  banker  shrugged  his  shoulders  in  indifference,  as  if 
he  cared  very  little  how  far  Peter  Kerr  went.  Yet  though 
he  had  decided  to  back  him  whether  any  of  the  others 
formed  a  pool  with  him  or  not,  he  was  secretly  angry  that 
this  complication  stould  have  arisen.  Kerr  stood  up  very 
slowly. 

"I  think,"  he  said  in  a  grim  sort  of  way  as  he  looked  round, 
"we  have  General  Shaw  to  thank  for  this.  He  is  on  the 
board  of  the  Indian  Commercial,  and  I  should  imagine  that 
he  has  learnt  some  details  of  my  scheme  and  has  simply 
adopted  them  for  the  benefit  of  his  colleagues.  It  is  doubt- 
less complimentary  on  his  part  to  have  acted  in  this  way, 
but  withal  it  is  a  little — a  little " 

Peter  Kerr  paused  for  a  minute  as  he  sought  for  a  word, 
and  instantly  his  mind  recurred  to  his  morning  in  the  park. 
It  was  curious  how  infectious  this  pausing  for  words  could 
become;  at  this  particular  juncture  it  was  embarrassing. 

"You  have  not  finished  what  you  were  going  to  say,  Mr. 
Kerr,"  said  Mr.  Charles  Marten,  a  little  roughly,  using 
the  prefix  for  the  first  time.  He  was  getting  openly  angry. 

Peter  Kerr  surveyed  him  for  an  instant  and  suddenly  fixed 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  39 

on  the  word.    He  would  not  show  his  hand — not  yet,  at  least. 

"It  was  a  little  unbusiness-like,  that  is  all,"  he  slowly  con- 
cluded. Mr.  Charles  Marten,  foiled  in  his  attempt  to  pro- 
voke him,  hesitated  a  moment  and  finally  stood  up,  as  if  he 
were  about  to  leave  the  room. 

"One  moment,  please." 

It  was  Jerkins,  the  American  financier,  who  had  spoken — 
Jerks,  as  he  was  already  familiarly  known  in  the  city, 
because  of  his  amazing  popularity.  He  had  started  to  his 
feet  at  the  same  time  as  Marten,  and  with  a  rapid  movement 
had  stepped  back  from  the  table  so  as  to  stand  nearly  beside 
him.  Now  he  began  speaking  in  his  sharp,  pointed  way, 
which  always  carried  so  much  conviction. 

"Gentlemen,"  he  said,  "this  meeting  is  becoming  very 
irregular.  We  met  here  to  listen  to  the  proposals  of  our 
mutual  friend  Mr.  Kerr,  but  for  some  reason  Mr.  Marten 
has  become  dissatisfied  and  angry  and  proposes  to  leave 
before  any  decision  has  been  arrived  at.  Now  to  my  mind 
this  whole  railway  project  is  a  very  important  scheme,  and 
the  details  which  Mr.  Kerr  has  disclosed  to  us  cannot  be 
carried  away  by  any  one  of  us  and  put  to  his  own  use.  They 
belong  to  Mr.  Kerr — to  Mr.  Kerr's  brain — and  his  copy- 
right must  be  protected.  I  think,  then,  that  we  are  justified 
in  demanding  that  Mr.  Marten  give  us  a  solemn  promise 
that  what  he  has  heard  to-day  is  strictly  confidential,  and 
that  under  no  circumstances  is  he  authorized  to  disclose  it 
to  third  parties.  Have  I  your  support,  gentlemen?" 

An  emphatic  murmur  of  approval  showed  that  Mr.  Jerkins 
had  effectively  isolated  Mr.  Marten  by  his  prompt  action. 
Without  giving  serious  offence  to  them  all,  the  dissentient 
could  not  leave  the  room  with  liberty  to  disclose  what  he 
had  learnt  to  his  fellow-directors.  For  a  moment,  indeed, 
Mr.  Marten  hesitated;  then,  remembering  that  the  com- 
bination was  too  strong  for  him,  with  an  effort  he  controlled 
himself,  and  assured  those  present  that  though  he  felt  it 
impossible  to  become  a  party  to  the  scheme,  he  would  not 


40  THE    HUMAN    COBWEB 

allow  a  word  to  pass  his  lips  of  what  he  had  heard.  After 
which,  curtly  excusing  himself,  he  took  up  his  hat  and  left 
the  room. 

A  little  silence  succeeded  his  departure,  but  the  shutting 
of  an  outer  door  assuring  them  that  this  obstructionist  was 
finally  out  of  the  way,  Jerkins  broke  into  a  roar  of  laughter 
and  tilted  himself  comfortably  back  in  his  chair. 

"Now  that  we  can  talk  as  amongst  friends,"  he  began 
easily,  "of  all  the  jays  I  have  ever  seen,  give  me  that  fellow 
Marten.  He  beats  everything.  Of  course  his  people  want 
this  thing — in  little  instalments  to  suit  their  little  public — 
that  is  as  clear  as  daylight;  and  his  coming  here  and  listen- 
ing carefully  to  everything  looks  to  me  like  a  put-up  job. 
Well,  we  will  beat  him  as  sure  as  my  name  is  Jerks  for 
short,  eh,  Barker?" 

Sir  James  Barker's  face  was  set  in  a  grim  smile.  He  nodded 
approvingly  to  the  American,  who  had  not  only  been  for  some 
time  closely  associated  with  him  in  various  enterprises,  but 
for  whom  he  had  also  a  warm  personal  regard.  Jerkins, 
they  said  in  the  city,  played  the  game  as  straight  as  any 
man  could,  and,  as  those  who  know  anything  of  the  higher 
finance  are  well  aware,  it  is  very  necessary  that  in  big 
matters  there  should  be  complete  faith.  Honour  among 
company-promoters  is  as  essential  as  among  less  enterprising 
folk. 

Sir  James  Barker  now  handled  a  large  sheet  of  foolscap  on 
which  were  a  number  of  typewritten  figures. 

"Gentlemen,"  he  said,  dropping  instinctively  into  a  formal 
tone  as  he  spoke  of  money,  "I  will  now  pass  on  to  the 
other  details.  We  need  £100,000  nominally  to  deal  with 
this  scheme.  Of  this  sum  £10,000  paid  up  will  be  ample 
for  the  moment.  The  rest  may  not  be  needed  for  several 
months.  I  propose  that  we  form  a  syndicate  consisting  of 
one  hundred  shares  of  £1,000  each.  Kerr  will  have  ten 
free  shares,  to  be  counted  as  fully  paid  up.  The  other 
ninety  we  will  split  among  ourselves.  I  am  willing  to  take 
as  many  as  you  like,  if  there  is  any  difficulty." 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  41 

There  was,  however,  no  such  difficulty.  Indeed,  as  Jer- 
kins had  friends  in  New  York  whom  he  proposed  to  interest 
at  once  in  the  matter,  there  was  a  sharp  battle  as  to  how 
many  shares  he  could  take.  He  pointed  out  that  it  would 
be  very  useful  to  let  him  have  a  big  interest  which  he  could 
re-parcel  among  his  friends,  as  then  the  co-operation  of  the 
American  government  might  be  insured  in  case  of  need. 
He  thought  there  could  be  no  question  oi  loss — they  were 
bound  to  get  their  money  back. 

After  some  further  discussion  everything  was  gradually 
smoothed  out  and  rough  minutes  were  drawn  up.  There 
would  be  plenty  of  time  to  develop  the  plan  of  campaign 
gradually,  now  that  the  initial  difficulty  had  been  overcome. 

Left  alone  to  finish  up  the  necessary  details  and  prepare  all 
the  numerous  documents,  Peter  Kerr  had  a  sudden  feeling  of 
exultation.  He  had  had  an  eventful  day;  he  was  pleased 
with  himself.  If  he  could  bring  this  thing  off  it  would  be 
a  master-stroke  indeed.  Refusing  all  help,  he  remained  there 
long  after  Barker  had  left,  working  and  unceasingly  think- 
ing. If  he  could  only  bring  this  ofE 

That  same  evening  Mrs.  John  West,  full  of  certain  ideas, 
addressed  her  husband  in  a  manner  characteristic  of  women 
who  must  be  obeyed. 

"John,"  she  remarked  briefly,  "are  Belgians  reliable 
people — I  mean,  can  one  trust  them  in  money  matters?" 

"That  is  rather  a  large  order,  Alice,"  replied  John  West, 
putting  his  paper  down  reluctantly  for  a  minute.  "Let  me 
understand  you.  Are  you  asking  me  as  an  abstract  proposi- 
tion whether  the  Belgian  nation  is  financially  sound,  or  do 
you  simply  mean  you  wish  to  find  out  whether  a  certain 
individual  has  a  good  reputation?" 

"How  stupid  men  always  are!"  murmured  his  wife  by  way 
of  reply,  whilst  she  stared  at  the  back  of  the  newspaper, 
which  once  more  formed  an  effective  mask.  Then  she 
made  up  her  mind  to  be  guardedly  frank.  "You  know  that 


42  THE   HUMAN    COBWEB 

Colonel  Maes  has  told  me  that  if  I  care  to  trust  him  he  may 
be  able  to  quadruple  my  money  in  a  year." 

John  West  whistled  sarcastically  from  behind  his  paper 
screen. 

"I  wish  I  could  do  that,"  he  commented.  "But,  my  dear 
woman,  the  thing  is  impossible — keep  your  money." 

His  wife  smiled  a  superior  smile  which  he  did  not  see. 

"John,"  she  said  in  a  manner  which  she  specially  reserved 
for  him,  "I  don't  propose  to  teach  you  anything  new  about 
finance,  but  if  you  were  not  so  interested  in  that  wretched 
newspaper  it  might  dawn  on  you  that  Colonel  Maes  pro- 
poses to  let  me  into  some  new  venture  before  the  public 
knows  anything  about  it.  And  then " 

Involuntarily  John  West  sat  up  sharply  and  abandoned 
his  reading.  This  sounded  like  business. 

"Oh,  I  remember  now,"  he  remarked,  thoughtfully  looking 
at  her.  "Then  they  are  getting  some  of  their  money  over 
here.  I  have  heard  one  or  two  whispers." 

"What  do  you  mean?"  asked  Mrs.  John  West  irritably. 
She  was  sorry  now  that  she  had  spoken. 

"Why,  those  Chinese  railways,  of  course.  Still,  if  you  do 
put  any  of  your  money  in  with  the  Belgians,  I  advise  you 
to  keep  very  quiet  about  it.  You  know  what  people  are." 

"Everybody  speculates  nowadays,"  announced  Mrs.  John 
West  a  little  irrelevantly,  looking  at  her  rings  and  thinking 
of  Peter  Kerr.  Her  husband  shrugged  his  shoulders  and 
got  up  to  get  another  paper.  He  had  learnt  wisdom  long 
ago. 

Things  always  move  all  at  once  or  not  at  all.  So  it  hap- 
pened that  almost  precisely  at  the  same  hour  as  this  little 
scene  was  proceeding,  Mrs.  May  came  home  after  a  long 
afternoon. 

"There  you  are,  Phyllis,"  she  remarked,  as  if  surprised. 
Mrs.  May  was  one  of  those  people  who  are  always  being 
surprised  at  nothing  in  particular.  "It  is  such  a  pity  you 
wouldn't  come  out  to-day.  I  have  such  a  lot  to  tell  you. 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  43 

There  was  a  regular  foreign  invasion  at  Lady  Watling's,  and, 
just  imagine,  I  had  to  talk  French  for  quite  half  an  hour 
with  nobody  to  help  me  with  those  wretched  verbs.  There 
was  one  man  I  took  quite  a  liking  to.  He  never  laughed 
once  at  my  mistakes.  He  is  going  to  call,  if  he  can  find 
time." 

"Who  is  the  man?"  inquired  Phyllis  indifferently,  when  her 
mother  finally  paused  to  take  breath. 

"A  Belgian — a  certain  Colonel  Maes,  who  is  the  leading 
spirit  in  some  great  enterprise  in  China." 

Mrs.  May  was  engaged  in  taking  off  her  hat  and  did  not 
notice  the  sudden  change  in  Phyllis. 

"I  have  heard  of  that  man,"  she  said  slowly,  trying  to 
recall  when  and  how.  "Somebody  told  me  something  about 
him  which  was  not  good.  I  remember  his  name  particularly 
because  it  is  pronounced  like  that  river  in  Belgium.  How 
did  you  find  out  that  he  was  going  to  China?" 

Mrs.  May  looked  suddenly  at  Phyllis,  and  then  went  on  in 
her  impassive  manner: 

"I  never  said  he  was  going  to  China,  my  dear.  But  I 
heard  him  asking  Mrs.  John  West  if  she  had  made  up  her 
mind  to  have  that  little  gamble  he  had  proposed;  and  then 
I  heard  him  say  that  he  was  sure  China  was  going  to  prove 
much  richer  than  Africa  had  been." 

Phyllis  hesitated,  but  only  for  a  moment.  She  remembered 
now  what  she  had  heard  about  the  man. 

"And  what  did  Mrs.  John  West  answer?" 

"She  laughed  a  little  at  his  eager  manner  and  told  him  that 
she  would  let  him  know  exactly  in  a  few  days,  as  there  was 
still  plenty  of  time." 

"How  interesting!"  said  Phyllis,  getting  up  presently  and 
moving  away  with  studied  indifference.  But  her  heart  was 
beating  fast;  for  she  knew  now  that  something  eventful 
was  preparing,  and  her  woman's  intuition  told  her  to  beware. 


CHAPTER  IV 

"Dans  les  premieres  passions,  les  femmes  aiment 
1'amant;    dans  les  autres  elles  aiment  1'amour." 

LA  ROCHEFOUCAULD. 

MRS.  JOHN  WEST'S  invitations  had  been  so  largely  accepted 
that  by  half-past  five  her  house  was  crowded  to  suffocation- 
point.  Not  that  any  one  cared  very  much  about  the  music 
with  which  they  were  to  be  regaled — they  were  a  good  deal 
too  civilized  for  that,  as  the  inevitable  German  professor 
observed  in  irony  to  his  hostess.  But  as  the  house  was  very 
spacious,  and  one  always  met  all  sorts  and  conditions  of 
people  in  it,  Mrs.  John  West's  entertainments  were  voted 
really  worth  going  to ;  for  the  amusement  they  afforded  was 
in  sharp  contrast  to  the  dullness  of  the  general  run  of 
such  affairs.  The  art  of  entertaining,  it  may  be  observed, 
has  now  been  largely  overdone;  and  the  novelty  of  holding 
mass-meetings  in  other  people's  houses  has  undoubtedly 
departed.  Once  upon  a  time  there  may  have  been  salons; 
now  they  are  mainly  scuffles. 

Still,  if  the  modern  hostess  is  fortunate  enough  to  know 
certain  incontrovertible  truths,  all  is  not  yet  lost.  One  of 
the  great  secrets  of  success  undoubtedly  lies  in  the  judicious 
handling  of  companies  of  men  confronted  by  battalions  of 
women.  If  the  men  become  frightened  victory  incontest- 
ably  remains  with  the  big  battalions;  if,  on  the  other  hand, 
the  unity,  energy,  and  numbers  of  the  fair  ones  are  met  in 
the  way  they  should  be  met,  military  science  can  borrow 
a  brilliant  lesson  from  the  drawing-rooms  of  the  moderns. 
And  thus  it  happened  that  Mrs.  John  West,  who  had  the 
gift  of  setting  people  at  ease,  moving  from  group  to  group, 
was  soon  happy  with  the  feeling  that  once  more  she  was 
successful  where  so  many  others  failed.  The  music,  it 


THE   HUMAN    COBWEB  45 

was  true,  was  hardly  listened  to,  but  that  was  a  detail  to 

her  so  long  as  people  were  happy. 

i 

Peter  Kerr  slipped  in  very  late  to  this  genial  gathering, 
taking  care  not  to  be  buttonholed  by  any  of  the  knots  of 
men  standing  at  the  doors.  He  had  no  desire  to  be  inter- 
rogated as  to  what  was  keeping  him  so  much  to  himself,  so 
he  observed  the  utmost  reserve.  Paragraphs  had  somehow 
already  crept  into  some  of  the  papers  regarding  a  great  scheme 
which  was  being  prepared  by  his  firm,  and  had  excited  general 
curiosity.  Sir  James  Barker  had  been  much  annoyed  at  his 
name  being  mentioned  in  the  same  connection,  and  had 
repeatedly  insisted  to  Kerr  on  the  necessity  of  preserving 
absolute  secrecy.  Kerr  himself  had  been  much  puzzled  at 
the  prevalence  of  these  rumours,  but  he  had  been  too  busy 
to  go  about  trying  to  trace  their  origin,  and  so  had  con- 
tented himself  with  making  indignant  denials.  The  idea  that 
he  was  being  watched  annoyed  him — it  showed  him  how 
much  he  would  have  to  contend  with  when  he  really  got  to 
work.  For  if  it  was  like  this  at  this  end,  what  would  it  be 
like  on  the  battle-ground  to  which  he  must  soon  proceed? 

He  exchanged  greetings  and  a  fire  of  small  talk  with  num- 
bers of  people  who  were  driven  in  little  eddies  against  him, 
as  he  slowly  made  his  way  forward;  and  gradually  in  this 
new  atmosphere  of  gaiety  and  unconcern  he  lost  his  newly- 
acquired  self-consciousness  which  was  so  disagreeable  to 
him.  He  inquired  vainly  for  his  hostess  at  frequent  intervals ; 
but  no  one  had  seen  her  lately,  and  in  the  present  crush  it 
was  hopeless  to  attempt  to  find  her.  So  he  contented  himself 
with  making  himself  agreeable  to  such  people  as  showed 
a  desire  to  stop  an  instant  and  talk  to  him,  all  the  while 
hunting  both  for  those  he  wished  to  avoid  and  those  he 
wished  to  see. 

Whilst  he  was  standing  more  or  less  happily  entrenched 
behind  an  eminently  safe-looking  matron,  whose  broad  back 
shielded  him  from  the  possibility  of  undesirable  frontal 
attacks,  he  felt  some  one  punch  him  humorously.  He 


46  THE  HUMAN   COBWEB 

turned  quickly  with  a  muttered  apology  as  he  bumped 
against  his  barricade,  and  found  himself  face  to  face  with 
Blessington — a  happy  youth  who,  thanks  to  the  efforts  of 
previous  generations,  was  engaged  in  passing  through  life 
in  joyous  idleness.  Blessington  eyed  him  with  a  merry, 
twinkle,  as  if  he  divined  his  defensive  attitude  and  wished 
speedily  to  undermine  it. 

"Lucky  beggar!"  he  murmured  confidentially,  winking  at 
the  same  time.  "I  hear  you  are  going  to  strike  it  rich — 
a  regular  gold-mine,  they  say,  which  will  give  you  millions 
and  influence  and  adventures  and  all  that  sort  of  thing. 
Also  I  hear,"  he  continued  mischievously,  as  he  saw  the 
frown  settling  down  on  Peter  Kerr's  face,  "that  later  on — 
eventually — we  may  expect  you  to  take  unto  yourself  a 
wife — a  girl,  in  fact,  who  has  just  been  making  outrageous 
remarks  to  me.  May  I  congratulate  you?" 

Blessington  paused  a  minute,  surveying  his  man  with 
innocent  delight.  He  liked  Kerr,  though  he  did  not  quite 
understand  him  and  thought  him  serious.  He  was  there- 
fore delighted  to  find  him  so  placed  that  no  amount  of 
studied  reserve,  or  even  anger,  could  beat  him  off.  Here, 
in  this  crowded  drawing-room,  he  had  Kerr  at  a  complete 
disadvantage,  and  the  idea  tickled  him  immensely. 

"May  I  congratulate  you?"  repeated  the  young  man,  as 
Kerr  did  not  answer. 

Kerr  looked  grimly  for  a  moment  into  Blessington's  smiling 
face.  He  was  on  the  point  of  becoming  angry  when  a  new 
idea  struck  him.  He  could  turn  the  incident  to  much  better 
account;  it  was  an  excellent  opportunity  indeed. 

"You  are  a  young  devil,"  he  said,  beginning  to  smile  in  spite 
of  himself,  "that  is,  a  regular  young  wolf  in  sheep's  clothing. 
Still,  at  least  you  can  do  me  the  service  of  letting  me  know 
how  you  found  out  all  this  interesting  news." 

As  he  spoke,  involuntarily  he  became  serious  again.  Bless- 
mgton,  however,  was  in  high  spirits  and  purposely  misunder- 
stood him. 

"How   I   found  out,"   he   replied  indifferently,   "I   heard 


THE  HUMAN   COBWEB  47 

that  it  was  all  arranged  the  other  night — in  this  house,  in 
fact — and  that  though  you  jibbed  at  first  at  the  idea  of  giving 
up  your  bachelor  state,  in  the  end  you  capitulated. " 

Peter  Kerr  seized  Blessington  by  both  arms. 

"Don't  be  too  foolish,"  he  said  quite  gravely.  "I  don't 
really  care  about  that.  You  may  gossip  all  you  like  about 
me  if  it  pleases  you,  but  what  I  want  to  know  is  the  other 
thing.  Who  told  you  about  the  scheme — my  scheme?" 

"Oh,"  said  Blessington,  with  a  look  of  real  surprise  coming 
over  his  face,  "it  is  true  then — the  scheme,  I  mean  ?  It  was 
rather  a  long  shot  of  mine,  I  confess,  for  I  only  overheard 
that  old  ass  from  India,  General  Shaw,  gassing  to  a  lot  of 
fellows  about  it.  There  he  is  over  there." 

Blessington  pointed  an  explanatory  finger  across  the  room. 
Certainly  it  was  General  Shaw — red  and  sultry  as  usual, 
and  still  engaged  in  talking  to  a  small  group  of  men  who 
were  attentively  listening  to  him. 

"It  was  Shaw,  was  it?"  commented  Peter  Kerr,  mechan- 
ically clenching  his  fists.  "This  is  a  real  service,  Blessing- 
ton,  and  I  am  much  obliged  to  you.  I  will  have  a  big  account 
to  settle  one  day."  He  paused  and  gazed  at  Blessington's 
face  very  reflectively.  "A  big  account,"  he  repeated. 

"Oh,"  rejoined  the  other,  "I  hope  I  have  not  made  trouble." 

He  was  a  little  disturbed  at  the  turn  things  had  taken. 
Though  he  was  supremely  thoughtless,  he  had  no  malice, 
and  now  he  appeared  genuinely  sorry. 

"I  hope  I  haven't  made  trouble,"  he  repeated  anxiously,  as 
Peter  Kerr  stood  there  motionless. 

"No,"  said  Peter  Kerr  finally,  as  if  he  had  now  examined 
the  question  in  all  its  bearings,  "you  have  not  made  trouble — 
in  fact,  you  have  done  me  yeoman  service.  I  begin  to  see 
how  things  are  moving.  I  should  be  much  obliged  to  you 
if  you  could  hint  to  a  certain  number  of  people  that  General 
Shaw  is  spreading  irresponsible  stories  about  me  as  a  result 
of  a  serious  difference  we  have  had.  If  you  can  do  that," 
he  went  on  slowly,  "later  on,  if  you  care  for  it,  I  will 
remember  you  if  my  scheme  comes  off." 


48  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

"Anything  to  oblige  you,  old  chap,"  said  Blessington,  show- 
ing relief  in  his  eager  voice,  "and  anything  also  for  a  shy 
at  the  Almighty  Dollar.  The  fact  is,  you  know,"  he  went 
on  in  confidential  tones,  "I  wouldn't  mind  adding  a  bit  to 
what  the  paternal  riches  bring  me  in.  Things  are  devilish 
expensive  nowadays,  and  what  looks  first-class  when  one  is 
twenty-one  is  not  so  very  big  when  one  is  twenty-five.  I 
tremble  to  think  of  the  prospect  when  I  am  full  thirty.  I 
cannot  open  a  bonnet-shop;  to  work  I  am  too  lazy.  Pity 
me,  please !  However,  I  understand.  I  will  do  some  talking, 
and  later  on  you  will  remember  me?" 

Kerr  assented,  and  began  talking  about  several  things  he 
would  like  him  to  say.  He  told  him  exactly  how  it  had 
happened  that  some  people  would  like  to  make  trouble  for 
him,  and  then,  without  going  into  too  many  details,  he  made 
Blessington  aware  of  his  approaching  departure. 

"Won't  you  let  me  into  the  secret?" 

Kerr  wheeled  sharply  as  he  heard  the  question,  without  con- 
cluding what  he  was  saying  to  his  new  ally.  It  was  Mrs. 
John  West  once  more  who  had  found  him  before  he  had 
found  her.  Now  she  stood  watching  him  with  a  challenging 
smile  as  he  murmured  his  excuses. 

"You  are  very  late,"  she  remarked  reproachfully,  stopping 
him  short.  "Everybody  is  beginning  to  go." 

"All  the  better,"  he  replied  with  gallantry,  "for  then  it 
may  be  possible  to  have  a  little  word  alone  with  you. 

Now "  He  made  a  gesture  of  despair  at  the  crowd  of 

people  who  were  openly  waiting  for  an  opportunity  to 
separate  them. 

"I  will  remember,"  said  Mrs.  John  West  with  a  little 
nod  as  she  moved  off. 

He  watched  her  moving  from  group  to  group  for  several 
minutes  in  much  the  same  surprise  as  he  had  experienced 
the  last  time  he  had  met  her.  Why  had  he  been  so  blind 
previously,  he  wondered.  She  was  dressed  in  a  dress  softened 
with  lace,  which  seemed  to  cling  to  her  and  added  much  to 
the  attractiveness  of  her  full  figure.  She  appeared  to  him 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  49 

more  soft  and  yielding  than  when  he  had  met  her  in  the 
park  on  his  morning  walk,  and  he  realized  that  there  was 
within  him  a  growing  feeling  of  annoyance  that  his  affairs — 
that  his  great  idea — should  not  only  have  absorbed  so  much 
of  his  time  recently,  but  that  he  should  soon  have  to  go  far 
away  and  become  lost  to  this  world.  It  was  only  now, 
with  his  departure  looming  up  very  close,  that  everything 
stood  out  clearly — that  he  understood  what  he  was  leaving — 
and  what  he  was  going  to.  What  if  the  men  who  opposed 
his  scheme  were  right  and  it  would  all  be  proved  a  wild-goose 
chase  consuming  a  great  deal  of  his  time — many  months,  if 
not  years?  Things  were  somehow  very  pleasant  just  now, 
and  he  was  wise  enough  to  knbw  that  one  cannot  be  to-mor- 
row just  as  one  is  to-day.  He  might  come  back  soured, 
disappointed,  finding  pleasure  in  nothing.  One's  progress 
through  life  is  marked  by  successive  stages  of  development — 
stages  which  often  look  like  permanent  stopping-places,  until 
one  is  suddenly  taught  that  there  can  be  no  such  things  and 
that  everything  indeed  in  the  world  is  subject  to  the  same 
laws  of  methodical  growth — and  decay.  He  suspected  that 
if  he  flung  himself  into  the  struggle,  no  matter  whether 
it  proved  successful  or  unsuccessful,  he  would  be  a  very 
different  man  when  it  was  over,  and  would  look  on  every- 
thing in  the  light  of  his  greater  experience.  That  would 
mean  that  his  eyes  would  see  differently — that  possibly  he 
would  have  a  distaste  for  hundreds  of  things — that • 

Peter  Kerr,  travelling  along  the  border-line  of  the  intan- 
gible, was  brought  back  suddenly  and  unquestionably  to 
realities  by  bumping  into  something  distinctly  concrete;  and 
to  his  surprise  he  found  that  he  had  inadvertently  been 
trying  to  push  through  the  back  of  a  chair  on  which  was 
seated  no  other  person  than  Phyllis  May.  His  surprise  was 
really  genuine. 

"Well,  that  is  kind  of  you,"  began  Phyllis  as  she  twisted 
herself  round  to  see  to  whom  she  was  indebted  for  this 
unexpected  assault.  "I  believe  you  could  have  done  it  if 
you  had  tried  a  little  harder ;  I  mean  you  could  have  actually 


50  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

pushed  clean  through  and  landed  me  on  the  floor.  Was  it 
abet?" 

Phyllis,  in  spite  of  herself,  began  laughing.  She  wanted  to 
be  quite  serious,  but  somehow  it  was  impossible. 

"I  am  awfully  sorry,"  replied  Peter  Kerr,  feeling  that  a 
great  many  things  were  somehow  happening  that  day,  for 
no  particular  reason,  and  that  it  would  have  been  wiser  if 
he  had  stayed  away.  "Though  I  am  apparently  disorderly, 
I  can  assure  you,  if  that  is  any  satisfaction,  that  I  am  not 
drunk.  What  I  was  doing  was  really  merely  figurative — I 
was  debating  to  myself  on  the  curious  way  one  pushes  along 
through  life " 

"I  hope,"  said  Phyllis,  suddenly  interrupting  him  in  her 
quick  way,  "that  you  will  note  how  much  of  an  obstacle  I 
can  be — both  involuntarily  and  figuratively,  of  course,  I 
mean."  She  was  always  saying  things  that  few  men  under- 
stood as  she  meant  them  to  be  understood,  and  which  came 
back  to  her  like  boomerangs. 

"You  are  worth  tripping  over,  I  assure  you,"  returned  Kerr 
with  a  laugh  and  a  bow. 

"Is  that  a  compliment?"  she  answered,  now  wondering  how 
her  own  remark  had  sounded.  "If  it  is,  it  is  one  of  those 
things  which  might  be  said  a  little  more  felicitously.  You 
should  have  denied  the  possibility  of  my  being  tripped  over." 

She  looked  at  him  quickly  and  then  suddenly  coloured 
faintly. 

"Your  touch  is  too  light  for  this  crush;  only  the  blunt 
method  has  effect  here,"  he  returned,  as,  suiting  the  action  to 
the  word,  he  deliberately  warded  off  some  one  who  was 
stepping  on  his  heels. 

"It  is  a  little  trying,"  Phyllis  confessed,  getting  up.  "Do 
you  mind  taking  me  to  some  less  combative  spot  ?  Your  last 
assault  on  my  chair  has  shaken  my  nerves,  I  believe." 

Phyllis's  eyes  were  sparkling  in  a  way  which  belied  her 
words  as  Peter  Kerr  forced  a  lane  for  her  through  the  crowd. 
If  she  had  not  forgotten,  at  least  she  had  buried  the  memory 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  51 

of  the  keen  disappointment  which  had  assailed  her  so  few 
evenings  before,  and,  whether  she  liked  to  admit  it  or  not, 
somehow  this  man  satisfied  her  more  than  other  men  from  the 
very  moment  she  saw  him.  Phyllis  would  have  laughed  at 
the  idea  that  she  was  in  love ;  she  did  not  quite  know  whether 
she  believed  in  love  at  all,  in  fact — in  the  ordinary  blind  and 
stupid  sense.  Yet  she  had  always  been  conscious  that  there 
is  such  a  thing  as  affinity,  which  may  seem  a  distinction 
without  a  difference,  but  which  is  nevertheless  not  so. 

"This  is  pleasant,"  confessed  Kerr  a  minute  later,  as  he 
leaned  back  and  gazed  thoughtfully  at  Phyllis.  He  had 
managed  to  find  a  quiet  spot  where  they  were  not  likely  to  be 
disturbed,  and  there  was  something  peculiarly  restful  about 
Phyllis  which  pleased  him  just  then  more  than  it  had  ever 
pleased  him  before.  She  seemed  far  removed  from  hard 
effort  and  the  striving  after  things  which  only  turn  to 
ashes.  She  made  him  feel  restful — satisfied — happier — and 
so,  suddenly  and  spontaneously,  his  heart  went  out  to  her  in 
a  way  which  he  could  not  explain. 

"I  am  not  going  to  entertain  you,  so  you  must  not  mind," 
he  continued  a  little  irrelevantly.  "I  feel  to-day  as  moody 
as  a  woman.  Perhaps  it  is  because  I  have  been  concentrating 
myself  too  much  on  one  thing,  and  being  mortally  sick  of 
that  one  thing  I  am  in  a  resentful  mood  about  everything 
else.  That  sounds  generally  stupid,  but  don't  be  too  critical." 

He  ended  a  trifle  awkwardly,  as  if  he  did  not  quite  know 
whether  this  strange  girl,  who  had  the  forehead  and  eyes  of 
a  child  and  the  brain  of  the  worldly-wise,  would  not  take 
advantage  of  him  and  begin  to  laugh.  But  Phyllis  had  never 
disappointed  him  that  way,  and  she  was  not  going  to  do  so 
now. 

"I  don't  mind  it  at  all,"  she  replied  with  a  gentleness  which 
surprised  him.  "Why  should  you  not  do  as  you  please?  It 
is  I  who  dragged  you  to  this  far-away  corner.  If  you  choose 
to  sit  quiet  until  the  spirit  moves  you,  I  shall  not  mind. 
Listen  to  the  sounds  in  the  distance;  they  are  very  restful." 


52  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

There  was  borne  to  them,  like  a  reflective  drone,  the  mur- 
mur of  many  subdued  voices  mixed  with  the  music  of  a  string 
quartette. 

"After  all,"  she  went  on  slowly,  as  if  she  were  musing 
aloud,  "there  is  a  good  deal  more  in  that  saying — that  speech, 
was  only  given  us  to  hide  our  thoughts — than  most  people 
imagine.  So  long  as  one  is  busy  with  one's  own  things — 
with  simple  things  having  to  do  with  the  everyday  routine  of 
life,  with  the  things  one  does  every  day — one  is  quite  natural. 
But  otherwise  why  should  one  be  natural  and  confide  in 
every  one  ?  I  never  do ;  and  so  if  I  made  you  talk  now  when 
you  don't  want  to,  you  would  only  say  things  which  mean 
nothing."  She  dropped  her  hands  on  her  lap  and  stared  at 
the  opposite  wall. 

Yet,  though  she  appeared  so  philosophical,  secretly  Phyllis 
wondered  what  Peter  Kerr  was  thinking  about.  There  had 
always  been  something  original  in  their  attitude  towards 
each  other,  and  latterly  this  peculiar  quality  had  been 
much  accentuated.  Phyllis  was  not  the  ordinary  young 
woman,  to  be  led  to  the  altar  of  Hymen  like  a  conscript 
belonging  to  the  yearly  draft,  and  she  had  always  been  in 
her  heart  of  hearts  glad  that  Peter  Kerr  had  not  accepted 
her  as  such.  Yet  though  she  believed  this  sincerely  enough, 
it  had  piqued  her  more  than  she  cared  to  confess  to  have 
had  him  think  it  necessary  to  emphasize  in  the  pointed  way 
he  had  done  the  other  day  that  the  splendid  isolation  of 
bachelordom  was  very  essential  to  his  plans  and  his  happi- 
ness. Altogether  Phyllis  just  then  would  have  had  some 
difficulty  in  explaining  her  real  state  of  mind  in  a  manner 
which  would  command  credence;  but  then  that  happens  to 
every  one  in  the  world  very  frequently  in  the  course  of 
every  twenty-four  hours. 

"I  think  you  are  refreshingly  wise,"  remarked  Kerr  quite 
sincerely  after  a  pause,  looking  her  frankly  in  the  eyes,  as 
she  turned  towards  him.  "Why  is  it  that  women  are  always 
so  much  wiser  than  men  in  the  small  things  that  mean  so 
much?" 


THE  HUMAN   COBWEB  53 

She  coloured  in  spite  of  herself,  seeing,  perhaps,  in  his 
words  something  more  than  appeared  on  the  surface. 

"Don't  be  absurd,"  she  protested.  "I  am  sure,  for  instance, 
that  your  flattery  of  my  sex  tickles  me  as  much  as  it  would 
the  silliest  woman  in  the  world.  I  adore  flattery;  it  is  the 
food  on  which  all  of  us  women  feed  as  much  as  possible,  and 
quite  rightly  too." 

"Ah,"  sighed  Peter  Kerr,  leaning  back  pensively,  "then  I 
am  afraid  that  I  shall  not  be  able  to  satisfy  your  hunger  much 
longer.  You  know  I  will  have  to  be  going  away  very  soon 
to  the  very  opposite  end  of  the  world,  where  there  will  be 
nothing  but  hard  work  and  no  play." 

The  colour  stole  back  to  her  cheeks  once  more:  she  had 
been  expecting  this. 

"You  are  really  going  soon?"  she  inquired  quickly,  in  an 
anxious  tone,  which  she  did  not  trouble  to  disguise.  "How 
soon?" 

Kerr  shook  his  head  slowly. 

"Who  knows?"  he  replied.  "We  are  waiting  for  some 
news,  and  are  meanwhile  completing  all  our  preparations. 
When  the  news  comes  and  our  preparations  are  finished,  I 
shall  have  to  go  within  twenty-four  hours,  so  you  may  not 
see  me  again  for  a  long  time.  And  the  best  of  the  joke,"  he 
concluded  moodily,  "is,  that  I,  who  started  the  whole  thing, 
am  already  tired  of  it  from  overwork.  Now  that  it  has 
come  to  the  point,  I  really  don't  want  to  exile  myself  a  little 
bit." 

Phyllis  did  not  answer  at  once.  She  toyed  with  a  slender 
gold  chain  which  hung  from  her  neck  to  her  waist,  running 
her  fingers  quickly  up  and  down  it,  as  if  the  action  soothed 
and  quieted  her. 

Suddenly — and  boldly — she  spoke: 

"Yet,  you  must  go,  you  know;  you  could  not  possibly 
draw  back  now.  You  will  have  to  go  and  make  a  great 
success  of  your  scheme.  Then  when  you  come  back  crowned 
with  glory,  you  will  be  very  thankful " 


54  THE  HUMAN   COBWEB 

She  did  not  finish  entirely,  but  sat  there  with  a  strangely 
earnest  expression  on  her  young  face.  Peter  Kerr  leant 
forward  and  looked  at  her  gravely. 

"How  curious  it  is,"  he  remarked,  "that  you  should  have 
said  that — that  you  should  be  wise  enough  to  say  it.  Of 
course  I  must  go  now  whether  I  like  it  or  not,  but  still,  not 
many  would  advise  a  man  that  way." 

Phyllis  breathed  a  little  more  quickly. 

"Every  one  would  say  it,"  she  answered  resolutely,  looking 
away  and  refusing  to  accept  his  view.  "Those  who  wouldn't 
say  it  would  not  be  worth  listening  to.  That  sounds  like 
an  Irishism,  but  it  is  just  plain  common  sense."  She  turned 
her  head  once  more  towards  him  and  smiled  faintly. 

Peter  Kerr  caught  the  mist  in  her  eyes. 

"Will  you  be  really  sorry?"  he  said  suddenly,  placing  one 
hand  gently  on  her  arm.  Involuntarily  she  drew  away  a 
little,  as  though  she  feared  that  in  her  present  mood  she 
would  only  be  weak  where  she  wished  to  be  strong. 

"You  must  not  do  that,"  she  said  in  real  agitation,  as  she 
attempted  to  shake  off  his  touch.  But  Peter  Kerr  had  taken 
her  hand,  and  that  gave  him  fresh  confidence. 

"Will  you  be  sorry?"  he  asked  again. 

"How  can  I  answer  questions  when  you  act  that  way?" 
she  protested  once  more  as  he  refused  to  release  her. 

"Questions  really  don't  need  answers  when  two  people 
understand  each  other  properly,"  he  rejoined  smilingly. 

"But  it  is  bad  to  understand  too  well — sometimes." 

"Why  ?"  he  asked  with  tantalizing  dullness. 

Phyllis  shrugged  her  shoulders.  Her  eyes  were  bright,  her 
cheeks  flushed,  her  red  lips  trembled.  Was  it  possible 
that 

"It's  your  fault,"  she  said,  trying  to  speak  calmly,  "if  I 
can't  talk  with  that  wisdom  which  you  were  belauding  only 
a  minute  ago." 

"Of  course  it's  my  fault,"  rejoined  Kerr.  "Still,  it  suits 
my  humour  and  I  like  it " 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  55 

"A  man,"  began  Phyllis,  "should  never  be  humoured." 
"Oh,"  murmured  Kerr,  "what  rank  heresy!     Now  I  will 
prove  to  you  the  very  contrary " 

It  is  not  at  all  certain  what  might  have  not  happened  had 
they  been  left  alone  one  little  minute  longer;  for  every- 
thing was  favourable  and  Cupid  was  amused.  But,  as  it 
happened,  the  hour  had  become  treacherously  late.  People 
had  been  taking  their  departure  so  rapidly  that  there  was 
hardly  any  one  left  save  those  last  few  who  never  seem  to  go. 

Mrs.  John  West,  a  little  excited  and  withal  somewhat  tired 
with  her  efforts  at  entertaining  so  many,  was  now  able  to  give 
a  sigh  of  relief  and  began  looking  for  Peter  Kerr.  She 
looked  here,  she  looked  there ;  where  had  the  man  gone  to  ? 

Perhaps  he  was  sitting  in  some  quiet  corner;  so  she  passed 
from  room  to  room,  her  surprise  increasing  at  his  elusiveness. 

The  thick  carpeting  gave  no  alarm,  and  therefore  the  first 
thing  that  made  the  two  aware  of  this  search  was  to  see 
Mrs.  John  West  standing  in  front  of  them,  red  with 
annoyance  and  anger. 

"Oh,"  she  exclaimed  sarcastically,  "I  am  really  very  sorry 
that  I  have  come  at  such  a  touching  moment.  I  must  go." 

Yet  she  did  not  move  an  inch — she  seemed  glued  to  the 
ground. 

It  is  to  Peter  Kerr's  credit  that  he  met  a  situation  of  some 
embarrassment  with  a  good  deal  of  nerve.  He  got  up,  and 
putting  his  hands  carelessly  in  his  pockets,  attempted  to  pass 
it  off  lightly.  Yet  he  remarked  that  the  two  women  observed 
each  other  with  ill-disguised  hostility.  Instinctively  Phyllis 
had  understood  something  she  had  understood  before.  What, 
he  wondered,  did  they  think  of  him? 

"It  was  all  my  fault,"  he  said  with  a  short  laugh. 

"Dear  Phyllis  was  having  her  fortune  told,  I  suppose," 
suggested  Mrs.  John  West.  "Was  she  really  born  under 
the  planet  Venus?" 

There  was  a  peculiar  intonation  in  her  voice  as  she 
addressed  them  both  which  carried  a  subtle  meaning. 


56  THE   HUMAN    COBWEB 

"Dear  Phyllis  was  not  having  her  fortune  told,"  remarked 
the  girl  hotly,  as  she  saw  that  Peter  Kerr  remained  silent. 
"And,  after  all,  what  she  was  being  told  was  her  own 
business.  Good-afternoon." 

And  thereupon,  in  hot  displeasure,  Phyllis  rustled  away  with 
such  rapidity  that  the  other  two  were  left  face  to  face  almost 
before  they  had  realized  what  had  come. 

"Everybody  gone?"  inquired  Kerr  with  assumed  cheerful- 
ness a  minute  later,  as  they  moved  off  together — meanwhile 
thinking  hard. 

"No,"  answered  Mrs.  John  West  with  pointed  brevity  as 
she  walked  towards  the  big  drawing-room. 

"Oh!"  said  Kerr  aloud,  beginning  to  realize  when  it  was 
too  late  the  seriousness  of  the  position.  "Damn!"  he  mut- 
tered angrily  under  his  breath.  And  at  the  very  first  oppor- 
tunity he  too  made  his  departure  in  greater  discontent  than 
ever. 

Oh,  how  curiously  is  the  human  cobweb  spun ! 


CHAPTER  V 

"La  plupart  des  hommes  emploient  la  premiere 
partie  de  leur  vie  a  rendre  1'autre  miserable." 

LA  BRUY£RE. 

SIR  JAMES  BARKER  represented  a  rather  uncommon  type  of 
man.  With  a  capacity  for  paying  great  care  and  attention 
to  detail  he  combined  a  large  and  speculative  mind  which 
enjoyed  taking  risks  and  saw  in  difficulties  only  tests  of 
ability.  It  was  a  well-known  axiom  of  his  that  most  disasters, 
financial  as  well  as  others,  sprang  from  and  were  indeed 
nothing  but  the  necessary  and  legitimate  offspring  of  ignor- 
ance or  carelessness.  Had  he  been  a  student  of  history,  he 
would  have  known  that  this  capacity  for  paying  immense 
attention  to  details  and  leaving  nothing  to  chance  was  prac- 
tically the  sole  reason  for  the  astounding  success  of  the 
first  Napoleon.  It  was  only  when  the  great  adventurer 
became  careless  that  disaster  dogged  his  footsteps. 

Sir  James  Barker  admitted,  of  course,  that  no  matter  how 
much  care  is  exercised  there  must  always  remain  things, 
which  the  wisest  and  most  prescient  of  men  cannot  possibly 
provide  for;  and  that  consequently  it  was  always  possible 
that  the  intervention  of  just  such  unknown  quantities  would 
take  away  success  when  it  appeared  assured.  But  just 
because  he  admitted  this,  whenever  he  took  any  serious  matter 
in  hand  he  sought  to  inform  himself  all  the  more  thoroughly 
from  every  point  of  view  of  all  unlikely  as  well  as  likely 
factors  in  a  given  problem.  That  was  his  strong  point — 
his  exceptional  gift.  Having  properly  weighed  and  thought 
over  these  various  matters,  he  proceeded  to  make  up  his 
mind  inflexibly;  and  by  a  policy  of  persistence  and  of 
constant  reinsurance — in  certain  ways  which  are  only  known 
in  detail  to  the  higher  finance — he  gradually  developed  each 


58  THE    HUMAN    COBWEB 

separate  scheme  so  well  that  hitherto  there  had  not  been  a 
single  important  failure  scored  against  him.  In  some  South 
American  and  African  ventures,  which  had  been  scouted  at 
by  all  the  more  important  finance  houses,  he  had  even  man- 
aged after  a  sharp  struggle  to  extract  a  tolerable  profit  after 
the  original  schemes  had  been  torn  to  shreds.  It  was  due, 
indeed,  to  this  quality  of  persisting  where  others  became  dis- 
couraged and  only  anxious,  in  the  market  phrase,  "to  cut 
their  loss,"  that  he  owed  his  exceptional  position  in  private 
international  finance. 

With  regard  to  Peter  Kerr's  great  scheme,  Sir  James 
Barker  was  by  no  means  certain  in  his  own  mind  that  success 
in  the  ordinary  acceptance  of  the  word  would  come  direct  to 
them — that  is,  that  it  would  be  possible  for  a  private  cor- 
poration to  induce  the  government  of  China  to  view  matters 
in  the  proper  light  and  quickly  to  take  in  hand  railway  con- 
struction on  a  gigantic  scale  so  as  to  anticipate,  and  thus 
frustrate,  all  other  European  schemes  of  encroachment.  But 
after  the  most  careful  analysis  of  the  situation  from  every 
point  of  view,  he  had  come  to  the  conclusion  that  even  if 
they  themselves  did  not  complete  their  scheme,  some  frag- 
ments thereof  would  mature  sooner  or  later.  For  somebody 
would  have  to  build  these  Chinese  railways;  and  as  their 
building  would  entail  large  demands  on  the  world's  money- 
markets,  when  these  demands  were  made  then  would  come 
his  chance  and  he  would  know  how  to  profit  by  it. 

For  though  very  few  people  realize  it  properly,  the  moneyed 
world  is  controlled  by  Only  a  few  dozen  men,  and  if  any 
one  of  these  sets  his  heart  on  any  particular  field  and  works 
in  it  persistently,  he  speedily  acquires  therein  a  sort  of 
right  of  prescription  which  his  fellows  are  careful  not  to 
contest.  Sir  James  Barker  knew,  therefore,  that  it  would  be 
easy  to  meet  subsequent  developments  in  the  Far  East  in 
such  a  way  as  to  insure  that  any  money  he  sunk  in  Kerr's 
scheme  would  come  back  to  him  if  he  carefully  studied  all 
rival  plans  and  made  his  dispositions  accordingly.  It  was 
merely  a  question  of  market  cunning  for  him  to  know 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  59 

when  and  where  to  act  so  as  to  participate  in  all  Chinese 
issues.  Real  success  is  for  those  who  sit  in  the  centre  of  the 
web,  however  much  the  contrary  may  appear  from  time  to 
time  to  be  the  case.  For  those  sitting  in  the  centre  are  the 
spiders — and  all  the  others  mere  flies — and  this  Sir  James 
Barker  well  knew. 

The  big  banker,  however,  had  been  careful  not  to  discuss 
things  in  such  a  way  with  Peter  Kerr  as  to  allow  his  enthu- 
siasm to  cool;  for  Sir  James  Barker  was  something  of  a 
student  of  men,  and  ample  experience  had  proved  to  him 
that  the  philosophic  state  of  mind  is  the  very  worst  one  for 
a  promoter  to  possess.  A  promoter  of  big  schemes,  like  the 
Dervish  fanatic,  must  be  an  uncompromising  enthusiast.  He 
must  do  or  die;  he  must  have  no  idea  of  defeat  or  retreat — 
that,  at  least,  was  Sir  James  Barker's  conception.  It  was 
reserved  for  the  men  behind  a  scheme,  he  held,  to  reconsider 
matters  should  such  reconsideration  become  imperative;  but 
no  inkling  of  this  should  ever  be  allowed  to  pass  to  those  on 
whom  the  brunt  of  the  battle  must  necessarily  fall.  It  will 
be  observed  that  between  Sir  James  Barker  and  Peter  Kerr 
there  was  a  considerable  difference  not  only  of  temperament 
but  also  of  ideas.  The  older  man  understood  the  variables  as 
well  as  the  constants  of  success;  the  younger  man  had  not 
yet  sufficiently  grasped  that  somewhat  extraordinary 
fact  that  what  may  be  mathematically  true  is  not  neces- 
sarily true,  and  that  the  wise  man  is  he  who  has  no  fixed 
ideas.  Therefore,  whilst  Peter  Kerr  believed  that  every- 
thing rested  on  his  shoulders,  and  that  the  others  must  stand 
or  fall  with  him,  Sir  James  Barker  knew  that  the  very 
reverse  might  prove  to  be  the  case.  Peter  Kerr  and  his 
scheme  was  an  experiment  to  the  big  banker  and  nothing 
else — for  Barker  was  a  wise  man,  and  was  never  carried 
away  by  a  fixed  idea. 

Though  some  time  had  now  elapsed  since  the  first  official 
meeting  at  the  bank,  to  all  inquiries  from  his  colleagues  as 
to  why  Peter  Kerr  did  not  start  at  once,  Barker  had  returned 


60  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

evasive  answers.  As  a  matter  of  fact  he  was  waiting  for 
certain  advices  from  the  Continent  before  settling  several 
important  points  in  his  future  policy;  he  wished  to  be  quite 
certain  that  the  developments  apparently  coming  in  from  the 
Far  East  would  not  be  suddenly  arrested  by  extraneous  influ- 
ences. He  relied  on  either  Paris  or  Brussels  to  give  him 
the  needed  information,  and  because  he  was  persistent  in 
his  inquiries  he  was  not  disappointed. 

On  the  very  afternoon  that  Peter  Kerr  was  being  so  tan- 
talized in  so  many  different  ways  the  banker  received  his 
long-expected  telegraphic  information.  Paris  and  Brussels — 
both  far  better  informed  regarding  the  secrets  of  all 
European  chancelleries  than  London  ever  can  be — informed 
him  that  it  was  practically  certain  that  the  China  policies 
of  the  various  Cabinets  had  been  definitely  settled,  and  that 
various  new  diplomatic  agreements  with  China  would  soon 
be  signed,  giving  an  aspect  of  permanence  to  the  tentative 
moves  which  had  been  made  some  weeks  before.  He  was 
told  that  he  could  rely  absolutely  on  the  information  given, 
though  it  was  still  a  closely-guarded  diplomatic  secret. 

Sir  James  Barker  lost  no  time.  Failing  to  find  Peter  Kerr 
anywhere  in  the  afternoon  by  messenger,  he  drove  himself 
to  Kerr's  flat  at  half-past  seven  o'clock.  Kerr  not  having 
returned,  the  banker  took  off  his  coat  and  installed  himself 
in  an  armchair.  He  would  wait,  no  matter  how  long  it 
might  be,  for  he  considered  the  matter  of  great  importance. 

His  persistence  was  very  speedily  rewarded,  for  Peter  Kerr 
had  walked  direct  from  Mrs.  John  West's,  and  was  only 
a  few  hundred  yards  away  when  Sir  James  Barker  had 
entered  his  rooms.  At  once  he  hurried  up  to  him  before 
taking  off  his  coat. 

"What  is  it?"  he  inquired  anxiously,  half  knowing  what 
it  must  be. 

"The  time  has  come,"  said  Barker,  showing  him  what  he 
had  received.  "The  time  has  come;  you  will  have  to  start 
at  once." 


THE  HUMAN  COBWEB  61 

Kerr  read  hurriedly  through  the  papers  he  was  handed. 

"Yes,"  he  replied  shortly,  as  soon  as  he  had  digested  their 
contents,  "I  will  have  to  start  at  once.  Let  me  see." 

He  went  to  a  writing-desk. 

"There  is  a  boat  leaving  Marseilles  in  three  days,"  he 
read  aloud  from  a  paper;  "I  can  just  catch  it." 

Barker  nodded  to  him  and  watched  him  thoughtfully. 

"Come  round  to  the  bank  to  say  good-bye  to-morrow  morn- 
ing," he  said.  "It  is  now  or  never,  for  I  think  things  will 
move  quickly." 

"Yes,"  replied  Kerr. 

They  separated  after  very  few  words  more,  for  they  were 
both  very  thoughtful. 

"That  chapter  is  over,"  said  Kerr  to  himself  as  soon  as 
Barker  had  gone,  thinking  of  his  afternoon.  "That  chapter 
is  over,"  he  repeated  morosely.  But  that  was  audacious  of 
him,  for  little  did  he  imagine  how  it  would  be  reopened. 

For  no  sooner  had  Mrs.  John  West  been  left  alone  than 
she  had  swept  down  on  her  writing-table  and  hurriedly  com- 
menced to  write.  She  had  a  good  deal  to  say,  since  that 
afternoon  she  had  heard  much  about  Peter  Kerr's  venture; 
and  at  last  she  had  made  up  her  mind  how  she  would  act. 
As  she  wrote  her  bosom  heaved  and  her  hands  trembled. 
"He  does  not  know  what  a  fool  he  has  been,"  she  exclaimed 
to  herself  again  and  again  in  her  excitement.  For  her  vanity 
had  been  deeply  wounded,  and  now  nothing  would  salve 
it  but  reprisals. 

Early  next  morning  Colonel  Maes  read  her  letter  in  his 
hotel  with  open  delight.  "At  last  things  begin  to  move," 
he  muttered  as  he  paced  quickly  up  and  down  his  room. 
"I  shall  really  be  able  to  learn  all  I  wish  about  these  amusing 
English,"  and  forthwith  he  too  prepared  for  action. 

Of  all  these  galvanized  people  Phyllis  alone  did  not  know 
what  to  do.  Though  she  was  ignorant  of  much  that  was 
going  on,  she  felt  that  she  had  made  a  crucial  mistake  that 
afternoon.  She  should  have  warned  Peter  Kerr;  she  should 


62  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

have  told  him  her  suspicions.  She  was  more  convinced  than 
ever  that  behind  Mrs.  John  West's  peculiar  attitude  lay 
some  peculiar  incentive.  Yet  now  it  was  too  late  to  say 
so — the  psychological  moment  had  plainly  passed.  For  if  she 
spoke  Peter  Kerr  would  conclude  that  jealousy  was  her 
motive,  that  she  desired  a  womanly  revenge.  Whereas  the 

simple  truth  was 

As  she  sat  there  alone  she  coloured  with  emotion.  No — 
after  the  way  he  had  let  things  end,  not  even  to  herself 
would  she  confess  what  that  simple  truth  might  be. 

In  such  foolish  ways  are  momentous  decisions  in  this  world 
arrived  at. 


BOOK   TWO 


CHAPTER  I 

"L'univers  est  une  espece  de  livre,  dont  on  n'a 
lu  que  la  premiere  page  quand  on  n'a  vu  que  son 
pays." — FOUGERET  DE  MoNBRON,  Le  Cosmopolite. 

PETER  KERR  pushed  his  sun-helmet  back  and  gave  vent  to  a 
long  sigh  of  relief.  The  train  was  undoubtedly  slackening 
its  speed.  It  was  doing  so  a  little  rebelliously,  almost  as  if  it 
feared  to  lose  the  hot  breeze  it  made  as  it  rushed  along  over 
the  lifeless,  sunburnt  plains;  but  still  it  was  slackening  its 
speed,  and  that  meant  that  this  long,  this  interminable  after- 
noon was  coming  to  an  end.  So  Peter  Kerr  sighed  with 
relief,  and  even  looked  with  renewed  interest  at  the  land- 
scape around  him. 

There  was,  however,  not  much  to  see  different  in  any  way 
from  that  which  he  had  been  watching  for  the  past  four  or 
five  hours.  Mostly  there  were  vast,  interminable  fields, 
covered  with  a  fast-sprouting  crop  which  seemed  turned 
almost  brown  in  the  dull  red  sunlight,  when  it  should  have 
been  only  green  with  the  joyousness  of  spring.  Through 
these  fields  crept  at  irregular  intervals,  as  if  they  were  in- 
truders with  no  real  locus  standi,  narrow  sinuous  cart-roads, 
rutted  very  deep  and  looking  brown,  brown,  brown.  This 
indeed  was  the  prevailing  colour,  the  essential  key-note.  The 
very  air  was  full  of  brownness  and  powdered  dust;  its  es- 
sence seemed  to  fill  heaven  and  earth.  Lines  of  clumsy 
country  carts,  drawn  by  big,  lolloping  teams  of  mules  and 
ponies,  sometimes  made  their  way  out  of  a  village,  and 
behind  them  they  too  left  great  powder-puffs  of  dust  floating 
in  the  still  air,  as  if  to  proclaim  once  more  the  strange  quality, 
of  the  soil. 

The  villages  themselves  were  different  from  any  villages 
Peter  Kerr  had  ever  seen  before;  they  were  mud-coloured 


66  THE  HUMAN   COBWEB 

villages,  made  of  mud  and  crouching  near  the  surface  of  the 
soil  in  ugly,  straggling  formations.  They  had  no  symmetry 
about  them;  they  seemed  to  have  risen  from  the  ground 
owing  to  some  convulsion  of  nature.  That,  however,  was 
only  the  first  impression.  Soon  they  appeared  to  the  eye  as 
they  should  be;  they  were  the  natural  outcome  of  the  en- 
vironment; they  fitted  in  with  their  surroundings.  And 
when  one  looked  at  them  long  and  tried  to  understand  them 
properly,  for  all  their  appearance  of  shiftlessness  they  became 
invested  with  a  certain  peculiar  loose- jointed  strength  and 
innate  virility  of  their  own.  They  were  like  the  man  who 
had  built  them — a  man  who  easily  survives  all  the  vicissitudes 
which  the  world  contains  in  its  many  regions,  in  spite  of  his 
unresisting  aspect.  Irresolute,  wandering  groves  of  trees 
were  distributed  round  these  villages,  as  if  their  action  was 
merely  tentative  and  subject  to  sudden  reconsideration.  At 
any  moment  they  might  be  felled  for  showing  an  impertinent 
individuality  of  their  own,  an  individuality  distinctly  at 
variance  with  the  earth-hugging — the  flattened — characteris- 
tic of  everything  else. 

For  the  trees  were  already  green,  if  nothing  else  was. 
Sometimes  they  were  quite  aggressively  green,  and  were 
marshalled  very  close  together,  as  if  to  show  that  they  domi- 
nated and  were  the  true  masters  of  some  big  square  piece  of 
soil  which  was  surrounded  by  a  low  wall  of  grey  brick. 
This  was  a  burial-ground — a  place  of  family  graves.  The 
green,  therefore,  was  emblematic  not  of  the  living  but  of 
the  never- forgotten  dead  in  an  ancestor-worshipping  country ; 
the  green  had  just  now  nothing  very  much  to  do  with  the 
living.  Even  the  little  red-walled  country  temples  had  no 
such  distinction  as  these  green-clad  family  burial-places ;  their 
broad  courtyards  were  almost  destitute  of  trees.  It  was  re- 
served for  the  graveyards  to  be  distinguished  by  their  ever- 
greenness. 

Over  this  vast  landscape,  which  in  the  wonderful  sunlight 
slowly  took  on  a  pensive,  wistful  beauty  of  its  own,  men, 
women,  and  children,  in  an  unending  monotone  of  blue  cloth- 


THE  HUMAN   COBWEB  67 

ing,  were  distributed  in  unexpected  places.  Sometimes  they 
were  squatting  together  half  hidden  under  some  high  bank, 
patiently  munching  food  out  of  big  bowls  or  gourds;  some- 
times they  suddenly  ran  out  from  a  sunken  road  and  as  sud- 
denly stopped  to  stare  in  unblinking  surprise  at  the  onrushing, 
whistling  train.  It  was  a  very  new  world  this,  thought 
Peter  Kerr,  leaning  his  face  on  his  hands.  It  was  vast, 
untamed.  It  was  a  world  of  millions  of  people  scratching 
the  soil  so  as  to  drag  therefrom  a  bare  sustenance — a  world 
of  people  surely  separated  from  him  and  his  ideas  by  gulfs 
which  he  could  not  even  imagine. 

Whilst  he  looked,  steadily  the  train  was  slackening  its  speed, 
whistling  more  and  more  persistently,  as  if  its  movements 
had  for  some  reason  become  a  matter  of  vital  importance 
to  all  within  possible  sight  or  hearing.  Peter  Kerr  could  now 
feel  the  brakes  being  applied;  the  wheels  were  adding  their 
screaming  protests  to  the  general  din  created  by  the  impend- 
ing stoppage.  The  figures  on  the  highways  and  byways 
became  clearer  and  more  frequent;  many  heavily-laden  carts 
were  now  halted  on  the  dusty  streaks  of  roadway,  waiting 
for  this  insistent,  masterful  thing,  which  arrogated  to  itself 
a  special  roadway,  to  pass  along.  The  stage  had  become  so 
small,  because  of  the  lesser  speed,  that  one  could  now  observe 
every  detail.  The  teams  of  mixed  draft-animals,  shouted 
at  and  chided  unceasingly  by  the  bronzed  drivers  as  the 
train  slid  past,  stood  to  attention  curiously  taut,  as  if  they 
were  tight-strung  to  their  rope-traces  and  nothing  could  break 
their  rigidity.  Their  staring  eyes  and  their  high-standing 
ears  showed  the  great  fear  which  had  come  over  them. 
Without  their  drivers'  voices  they  would  count  themselves 
lost  souls.  They  would  break  away — they  would  jump — 
they  would  kick — every  madness  would  possess  them.  It 
was  rather  unique,  thought  Peter  Kerr,  as  his  window-pane 
played  the  part  of  a  kaleidoscope. 

"PEKING!" 

A  voice  shouting  this  suddenly  awoke  him  with  a  start  to 
what  he  had  obviously  known  for  many  minutes.  He 


68  THE  HUMAN   COBWEB 

reflected  for  a  moment  how  it  is  always  like  that  at  the 
end  of  a  long  voyage — how  the  obvious  is  surprising  and  even 
distressful.  Then  with  a  thump  he  let  the  wire-gauze  win- 
dow down  and  thrust  out  his  head. 

Peking — where  was  it? 

Immediately  ahead,  as  far  as  he  could  see,  there  was  nothing 
but  larger  collections  of  these  low-lying  mud  buildings  with 
which  the  last  few  hours  had  made  him  familiar.  They 
were  now  adorned,  however,  with  great  black  characters 
painted  on  a  whitewashed  ground;  that  meant  warehouses 
for  goods — godowns,  as  they  were  called,  he  thought.  It  was 
obviously  the  end  of  the  line,  but  where  was  this  Peking? 

The  train  swerved  heavily  as  it  took  a  vast  curve,  and  there, 
suddenly  disclosed  to  his  eyes,  was  a  grey,  crenellated  city 
wall  with  little  towers  crowning  it  at  regular  intervals.  He 
had  an  involuntary  feeling  of  disappointment.  Though  it 
was  a  couple  of  miles  off,  it  did  not  seem  as  imposing  as 
he  had  been  led  to  believe.  A  little  irritably,  he  turned  to  a 
fellow-traveller  who  seemed  to  know  everything. 

"Is  that  Peking?"  he  asked,  embracing  with  a  wave  of  his 
hand  the  distant  wall-line. 

"Yes  and  no,"  answered  his  companion.  "It  is  only  the 
Outer  city — the  so-called  Chinese  city.  Inside  of  that,  or 
rather  joined  on  to  it,  is  the  Tartar  city — the  real  Peking 
of  the  Tartars.  Just  now  there  is  nothing  to  see.  You  will 
have  to  ride  in  before  you  can  understand  it." 

Peter  Kerr  relapsed  into  silence  and  busied  himself  closing 
his  bags.  He  remembered  that  railways  in  this  land  had 
been  hated  and  forbidden  things.  So  this  one — almost  the 
only  railway  in  the  country — only  approached  as  near  as  it 
dared  to  the  capital.  This  was  the  explanation:  he  remem- 
bered haying  heard  it  already. 

Slowly,  very  slowly,  the  train  lumbered  to  the  begrudged 
standstill.  It  appeared  unconquerable!  It  creaked,  it 
groaned,  and  yet  it  lumbered  on.  Shouting,  jostling  crowds 
of  blue-clad,  brown-faced  men  grew  up  alongside  many  sec- 
onds before  it  had  completely  stopped,  and  began  accompany- 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  69 

ing  the  carriages  at  a  run.  There  was  no  platform  at  all, 
and  the  station,  save  for  a  solitary  half-completed  building, 
was  simply  a  vast  open  space  lined  with  sidings  and  littered 
with  all  manner  of  things.  Numbers  of  these  blue-clad, 
brown-faced  men  pulled  after  them  into  the  jostling  throng 
donkeys  and  ponies  which  viewed  with  contemptuous  indif- 
ference the  bustle  round  them.  Other  men,  armed  with 
little  white  flags  which  were  adorned  with  a  few  square 
characters,  contented  themselves  with  waving  and  gesticu- 
lating frantically  to  the  masses  of  native  travellers  who  would 
soon  alight.  These  were  inn-keepers'  touts  sent  to  secure 
custom.  Drawn  up  in  regular  lines  some  distance  away 
were  endless  numbers  of  the  famous  Peking  carts  with  their 
rigid  blue-cloth  hoods  and  their  massive  nail-studded  wheels. 
Backing  dogs  added  to  all  this  confusion;  and  here,  there, 
and  everywhere  appeared  men  selling  cakes,  men  selling  fruit, 
men  selling  sweets,  as  well  as  men  selling  steaming  hot  food, 
which  they  doled  out  of  little  portable  kitchens  slung  on 
poles.  No  wonder  the  train  had  whistled  so  much.  A  whole 
population  awaited  its  arrival. 

The  final  pull-up  came  so  sharply  that  Peter  Kerr  was 
flung  forward  on  to  a  seat ;  and  as  he  picked  up  his  fallen  sun- 
helmet  he  heard  the  babel  of  voices  rise  suddenly  like  a  tidal- 
wave  and  sweep  on  to  the  train,  inundating  everything  and 
completely  drowning  every  other  sound.  This  virile,  reek- 
ing, shouting  mob  was  boarding  the  train;  it  was  time  to 
stand  by  and  repel  boarders. 

Instinctively  he  gripped  his  traps  and  stood  ready.  Unseen 
hands  were  twisting  back  every  door;  men  wrestled  franti- 
cally in  sweaty  groups,  and  because  of  the  jam  they  made 
none  could  get  forward.  These  sounds  of  battle  increased 
every  second.  The  touts  and  runners,  who  infest  every 
stopping-place  in  China  and  openly  fight  over  the  bodies  of 
their  victims,  were  at  work.  Even  in  the  Hongkong  harbour, 
with  smart  police  launches  on  duty,  hundreds  of  sampans 
manage  to  surround  every  incoming  vessel  as  fish  do  a  piece 
of  food,  and  before  anchor  has  been  cast  dozens  of  men  will 


70  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

swarm  on  board  by  means  of  long  boat-hooks  up  which  they 
clamber  with  the  agility  of  monkeys.  Casting  these  back 
into  the  sea,  as  soon  as  their  grip  is  secure,  they  fall  on  native 
travellers'  luggage  with  their  inn  labels,  and  secure  custom 
by  brute  force.  That  is  surely  business  with  a  vengeance. 

Though  he  was  prepared  for  every  emergency,  though  he 
had  already  seen  these  things,  Peter  Kerr  certainly  did  not 
expect  the  denouement  which  now  came.  For  suddenly  the 
door  nearest  him  was  flung  open  by  a  firm  hand,  and  there 
appeared  an  immensely  fat  Chinaman,  crowned  with  a  big, 
discoloured  Terai  hat.  His  other  chief  features  were  a  great 
silver  watch-chain  slung  across  his  chest,  a  broad  flannel 
cholera-belt  worn  outside  his  waistcoat,  and  a  serviceable 
cane.  He  was  wonderful. 

The  fat  man  grinned  all  over  as  he  clumsily  removed  his 
headgear  and  bowed  in  a  deferential  way.  Then,  before 
he  had  spoken,  he  turned  with  startling  rapidity  and  hurled 
his  great  weight  against  the  entrance  just  in  time  to  crush 
back  a  confused  mass  of  men  who  were  pushing  forward. 
Still  not  uttering  a  word,  as  these  poor  devils  fell  back  snarl- 
ing and  cursing,  he  shut  the  door  on  them  and  applied  his 
weight  to  keep  it  securely  shut.  Peter  Kerr  burst  out  laugh- 
ing. These  tactics  were  eminently  practical. 

"Dam  fool!"  commented  the  fat  man  pithily,  jerking  a 
hand  over  his  shoulder.  Then,  remaining  as  he  was,  very 
carefully  he  sought  within  the  pocket  of  his  short  coat  and 
drew  therefrom  a  much  wrinkled  and  somewhat  dirty  piece 
of  paper. 

"Mister  Kerr?"  he  inquired  in  the  same  jerky  manner, 
spacing  out  his  syllables  after  the  Oriental  way.  "All  right 
— very  good.  Your  telegram  duly  received.  Hotel  have 
send  ponies."  His  language  was  like  his  attire;  it  was  an 
odd  mixture  of  two  conflicting  civilizations. 

Still  keeping  his  massive  back  against  the  door,  he  inspected 
the  luggage;  and  having  quickly  made  up  his  mind,  he  sud- 
denly stepped  nimbly  aside  and  let  three  or  four  men  tumble 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  71 

through  the  door,  only  to  pinion  back  the  rest  while  the  bags 
were  gathered  up. 

"Hao-la,"  he  called  to  the  coolies  as  they  stood  with  the 
things  strapped  to  their  shoulders.  "Hao-la"  they  called 
back;  and  mentioning  to  Peter  Kerr  to  stand  aside,  at  last 
he  let  go  his  hold  completely  and  allowed  the  devastating  mob 
to  sweep  through  the  carriage.  Having  thus  scientifically 
attended  to  things  with  the  least  possible  fuss,  he  led  the 
way  out. 

"You're  a  great  man,"  remarked  Peter  Kerr  with  a  laugh 
of  approval  as  he  waited  for  the  next  step.  He  was  almost 
sure  he  would  like  this  people.  This  person,  for  instance, 
was  worthy  of  praise.  He  had  no  use  for  the  superfluous; 
he  went  straight  to  the  point. 

But  the  fat  man  was  not  heeding  him.  With  a  methodical 
attention  to  business  which  was  somewhat  admirable,  he  was 
now  engaged  in  settling  a  little  affair  which  had  apparently 
been  allowed  to  hang  over  until  the  more  pressing  matter 
of  landing  his  charge  from  the  train  had  been  attended  to. 
With  one  brawny  arm  round  a  lean  coolie's  neck,  he  was 
threatening  to  belabour  his  compatriot  with  his  cane  if  he  did 
not  do  something.  For  a  while  the  coolie  remained  stolidly 
obdurate,  though  his  head  was  in  chancery  and  his  neck  was 
being  wrung;  then  deciding  with  the  curious  philosophy  of 
his  race  that  the  game  was  up,  he  dropped  on  his  knees  and 
bobbed  up  and  down  in  open  contrition.  The  fat  man  imme- 
diately let  go,  and  grinned  round  satisfied  at  Peter  Kerr. 

"Dam  fool,  squeezing  me,"  he  pithily  explained  once  more, 
with  another  waggish  jerk  of  his  head.  Peter  Kerr  had 
thought  the  squeezing  was  all  on  the  other  side.  But  the 
fat  man  opened  his  hand  and  showed  a  silver  ten-cent  piece 
he  had  thus  neatly  recovered;  the  squeeze  was  purely  meta- 
phorical. Manifestly,  if  things  began  like  this,  here  was 
obviously  a  country  of  many  possibilities.  There  was  con- 
stant action,  and  people  acted  with  admirable  simplicity. 

Peter  Kerr,  amused  and  smiling,  followed  his  guide  through 
the  sweating,  shouting  throng  to  the  serried  lines  of  blue- 


72  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

hooded  Peking  carts.  Native  travellers,  now  literally 
dragged  along  by  insistent  touts  who  never  ceased  dis- 
puting and  arguing  with  one  another,  were  being  thrust, 
together  with  their  impedimenta,  into  these  conveyances. 
These  travellers  uttered  cries  which  sounded  to  a  stranger's 
ears  like  piteous  protests  at  such  unceremonious  treatment. 
Yet  they  were  nothing  of  the  kind.  In  reality  they  were  only 
vociferous  attempts  to  beat  down  prices  before  a  surrender 
was  made  to  the  inevitable  fate  of  being  driven  to  inns  where 
every  mother's  son  would  carefully  and  cunningly  combine 
to  extract  money  to  the  uttermost  farthing.  It  was  a  battle 
in  which  victory  remained  with  the  strongest  lungs.  As  a 
first  experience  it  might  be  termed  amazing. 

The  fat  man,  being  of  the  land,  was  entirely  indifferent  to 
all  such  things.  If  there  was  a  noise,  he  did  not  know  it. 
If  he  was  beaten  aside  by  a  great  press  of  people,  he  merely 
threw  his  weight  against  the  crowd  and  readjusted  the  bal- 
ance. Like  a  football  player  he  humped  his  way  towards  the 
goal — which  in  this  case  was  a  shaggy,  stumpy  pony  held  by 
a  very  little  boy.  The  very  little  boy  had  bare  feet  and  legs 
and  black  twinkling  eyes  and  was  engaged  in  open  warfare 
with  another  small  person  who  was  circling  round  his 
Rosinante  and  slily  digging  him  in  the  ribs  with  a  piece  of 
bamboo  to  make  him  kick.  This  comedy  ceased  magically 
with  the  appearance  of  the  fat  man,  who  was  evidently 
feared.  Peter  Kerr  was  drinking  it  all  greedily  in  and 
lingered  a  little  behind.  The  scene  and  the  excitement  ap- 
pealed to  him  in  many  ways.  He  had  never  seen  anything 
like  it  before.  It  was  more  like  a  play  than  real  life :  there 
appeared  endless  dramatic  possibilities. 

A  donkeyman,  seeing  him  stop,  rapidly  urged  his  little  beast 
towards  him  with  those  curious  guttural  cries  and  clicks  of 
the  tongue  which  form  the  Chinese  language  of  animals.  As 
soon  as  he  had  reached  him,  seizing  him  in  an  oddly  friendly 
way  by  the  arm,  the  donkeyman  tried  to  persuade  him  to 
mount  the  little  beast's  red  pack.  Peter  Kerr  smilingly 
pointed  to  his  pony;  but  the  Chinaman  was  not  to  be  denied. 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  73 

Like  a  cunning  salesman  knowing  how  best  to  advertise  his 
wares,  suddenly  he  jumped  on  the  donkey  himself,  rode 
him  rapidly  round  in  a  circle  to  show  his  paces,  and  then 
brought  him  to  a  standstill  as  if  a  Westinghouse  brake  had 
been  applied.  The  little  animal  was  all  sinews  and  muscles; 
who  could  be  hard-hearted  enough  to  refuse  him  ? 

But  Peter  Kerr  had  to  refuse,  and  intimated  this  by  making 
his  way  up  to  the  pony.  Thereupon  the  donkeyman,  as  if  it 
had  been  all  a  play,  suddenly  relaxed  his  efforts,  and  leaning 
his  elbows  on  his  donkey's  pack  grinned  most  affably.  He 
said  as  clearly  as  if  he  had  spoken,  "It  really  does  not 
matter." 

"You  are  certainly  all  good-natured,"  remarked  Kerr  to 
the  fat  man  as  he  mounted  the  pony ;  and  the  fat  man,  though 
perhaps  he  did  not  understand,  grinned  too.  Peter  Kerr  had 
not  known  that  they  would  all  laugh  so  easily;  real  good 
humour  is  generally  associated  only  with  negroes,  whereas 
all  Asia  is  full  of  good-humoured  and  easy-going  people  who 
do  not  worry  much. 

But  suddenly  the  fat  man  exchanged  his  grin  for  a  troubled 
look.  His  round  moon  face  became  surcharged  with  strange 
perplexity,  and  he  scratched  himself  with  inelegant  vigour. 

"Only  one  pony,"  he  said  finally,  as  if  that  obvious  fact  had 
only  just  dawned  upon  him.  "I  take  luggage,  must  wait. 
You  find  way?" 

"No,"  replied  Peter  Kerr,  "I  probably  won't.  I  shall 
get  lost." 

"Oh!"  said  the  fat  man  reflectively,  as  a  white  man  would 
have  done.  Then  he  suddenly  swung  on  the  donkeyman 
who  had  been  so  attentive,  and  poured  forth  on  him  a  torrent 
of  words.  Instantly  the  donkeyman  called  "hao-la"  as  the 
luggage  coolies  had  done,  and  leapt  like  a  clown  on  to  his 
pack. 

"Lai,  lai"  he  called  encouragingly  to  Peter  Kerr.  He 
whacked  his  willing  little  beast  and  beckoned  violently  at  one 
and  the  same  time. 

"All  right,  no  fear,"  echoed  the  fat  man  reassuringly.    "He 


74  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

take  you.  No  fear,"  and  with  this  last  reflection  he  left 
Peter  Kerr  to  follow  the  man  as  best  he  could. 

The  shouts  and  chirrups  of  the  donkeyman,  engaged  joy- 
ously in  clearing  the  way  for  this  unexpected  profit-taking, 
left  a  trail  of  sound  behind  which  was  sufficient  to  guide 
Peter  Kerr  after  him  through  the  thick  crowd  at  a  fast 
trot;  and  presently,  leaving  the  neighbourhood  of  the  camp- 
like  station,  they  were  pounding  along  one  of  those  strange 
rutted  highways  belonging  by  direct  descent  to  the  middle 
ages,  and  which  had  been  so  constantly  visible  from  the 
train.  Carts,  mules,  donkeys,  and  ponies — all  were  now 
moving  forward  in  the  same  direction  at  the  same  steady 
amble,  and  soon  Peter  Kerr  was  powdered  from  head  to  foot 
with  fine  grey  dust.  There  were  unending  lines  of  these  con- 
veyances and  animals;  it  was  exactly  like  the  baggage-train 
of  an  army  moving  swiftly  in  retreat.  Sometimes  this  dust 
became  so  thick  that  Peter  Kerr  could  only  just  see  ahead 
of  him  the  dim  outline  of  the  donkeyman  seated  on  his  fast- 
stepping  little  beast.  Yet  the  donkeyman,  all  arms  and  legs, 
as  he  drove  at  topmost  speed,  minded  this  inconvenience  so 
little  that  he  shouted  and  grunted  encouragement  the  whole 
time;  and  thus,  in  spite  of  the  incongruity  of  the  pair  and 
the  dissimilarity  of  their  mounts,  their  rate  of  travelling 
accorded  exactly.  The  donkeyman,  thought  Peter  Kerr,  was 
a  fit  Sancho  Panza  to  his  Don  Quixote,  and  as  he  felt 
the  weedy  mount  between  his  knees,  he  was  sure  that  Rosi- 
nante  had  not  died  childless.  Perhaps,  also  he  thought,  like 
the  hero  of  the  Spanish  Chronicler,  he  might  be  proceeding 
to  the  conquest  of  the  impossible.  Who  knew — who  could 
say?  And  amid  these  reflections,  pressing  along  quickly,  the 
city  wall  soon  grew  up  alongside  almost  unobserved.  They 
had  arrived  at  the  Outer  city. 

Suddenly  ahead  a  big  block  was  apparent.  For  some  reason 
carts,  mules,  ponies,  and  donkeys,  all  racing  into  the  walled 
city  through  this  maelstrom  of  dust,  had  been  halted  with  a 
jerk;  and  now  everybody  was  peering  ahead  and  cursing  the 
delay.  What  had  caused  the  block  was  not  immediately 


THE   HUMAN    COBWEB  75 

apparent;  but  presently  a  distant  clang  of  curious,  hollow- 
sounding  bells,  possessing  a  deep  yet  tin-like  note,  began  and 
steadily  came  nearer  and  nearer,  the  volume  of  sound  con- 
stantly increasing. 

"Lo-to,  Lo-to." 

Peter  Kerr,  with  his  ears  attuned  to  catch  the  strange  new 
sounds  of  a  strange  land,  heard  every  one  exclaim  these  words 
discontentedly.  He  wondered  what  they  meant.  He  was 
not  enlightened  until  he  saw,  moving  majestically  down  on 
him,  unending  lines  of  shadowy  forms,  looking  immense  in 
the  dust,  with  the  slow  bell-clanging  marking  their  rhythmic 
progress.  They  were  camels — certainly  hundreds  of  camels, 
if  not  thousands  of  camels.  A  great  caravan  was  passing  out 
of  the  city,  bound  for  the  passes  which  lead  through  the 
mountains  and  the  Great  Wall  of  China  to  Mongolia,  and 
thence  on  to  China's  most  distant  dominions,  called  variously 
Zungaria,  Eastern  Turkestan,  or  the  New  Dominion.  Peter 
Kerr  had  read  of  this.  Now  that  he  was  face  to  face  for 
the  first  time  with  these  strange  beasts  of  burden,  which  can 
carry  such  small  weights,  and  yet  are  the  cheapest  and  only 
method  of  transportation  in  a  waterless  and  foodless  country, 
he  eagerly  watched. 

Each  driver,  with  a  blue  cloth  tied  round  his  head,  and 
walking  with  the  rolling  awkward  walk  of  the  camels  them- 
selves, led  six  or  seven  beasts  behind  him  exactly  as  a  loco- 
motive hauls  a  train;  each  of  the  six  or  seven  animals — 
seven  being  the  driver's  proper  number — was  tied  by  a  stout 
nose-string  to  the  one  in  front  of  it,  the  last  camel  having 
the  rude,  clanking  iron  bell  swung  round  its  neck.  On  each 
animal  was  the  same  load — two  small  chests  of  perhaps 
eighty  pounds'  weight  each,  which  were  slung  between  the 
double  hump  on  a  rude  pack-saddle.  The  camel-drivers, 
rough  fellows  burnt  a  deep  copper  colour  from  constant 
exposure  to  the  elements,  seemed  to  be  sauntering  along  as  if 
they  were  strolling  to  nowhere  in  particular,  for  pack-camels 
only  travel  two  miles  an  hour  and  cannot  be  hurried.  Yet 
perhaps  this  caravan  was  plodding  away  on  a  long  journey 


76  THE   HUMAN    COBWEB 

which  would  end  only  somewhere  in  the  middle  of  Asia. 
Here  was  a  romantic  and  barbaric  flavour  at  the  very  city 
gates. 

It  was  many  minutes  before  the  musical  bell-clanging  and 
the  solemn  and  stately  march  passed  away.  Then,  as  Peter 
Kerr  finally  followed  his  guide  over  the  stoneway  leading 
through  the  first  gate,  he  had  a  constant  struggle  to  prevent 
his  low-stepping  pony  from  coming  down.  The  stone  flags, 
worn  and  rounded  and  polished  by  the  endless  traffic,  were 
as  slippery  as  glass.  And  in  addition,  between  the 
stone  flags  were  deep  holes  literally  dug  out  by  the  grind 
of  ten  million  cart-wheels  in  ages  past — holes  capable  of 
flinging  down  the  unwary  with  a  cruel  fall,  since  it  was  im- 
possible to  see  them  until  too  late.  In  the  crush  and  dust 
and  clamour — for  the  archway  was  filled  with  a  roar  of 
sound — Peter  Kerr  blessed  the  good  luck  which  carried  him 
through  without  mishap.  It  was  not  a  question  of  riding; 
it  was  far  more  like  piloting  a  ship  through  dangerous  sub- 
merged reefs. 

Once  inside  the  gate,  however,  these  dangers  ceased,  and 
the  city  opened  up  in  front  of  him  with  a  vista  of  bounteous 
amplitude.  From  this  outer  gateway,  straight  as  a  ruled 
line,  ran  the  broad  stoneway  leading  to  the  still  more  impor- 
tant Central  Gate  of  the  Inner  or  Tartar  city.  On  this 
ruled  line  rumbled  and  bumped  a  seething  tide  of  traffic. 
To  the  right  and  left,  however,  were  great  empty  spaces 
full  of  extraordinary  hollows  and  ugly  mounds  made  by  the 
ravages  of  time — empty  spaces  which  only  ended  in  two 
immense  enclosures  shut  in  by  heavy  walls  against  which  sand- 
hills had  piled  themselves.  The  one  on  the  eastern  side  was 
the  far-famed  Temple  of  Heaven;  on  the  western  side  was 
the  less  celebrated  but  equally  spacious  Temple  of  Agri- 
culture. Both  were  vast  enclosures  worthy  of  Asiatic 
Caesars.  From  this  distant  central  stoneway,  at  first  only 
the  glinting  green-tiled  roofs  and  the  red-painted  entrances 
were  visible  to  Peter  Kerr,  together  with  an  uncertain  view 
of  green  tree-tops,  marking  the  stately  avenues  which  lead 


THE   HUMAN    COBWEB  77 

through  these  noble,  secluded  grounds.  But  when  a  little 
carved  marble  bridge  is  reached,  over  which  no  one  but  the 
Emperor  may  pass,  and  round  which  eddies  in  two  broken 
streams  the  endless  traffic  of  the  workaday  world — when 
this  marble  bridge  is  reached,  it  is  possible  to  see  rising  high 
above  the  surrounding  walls  the  cerulean  blue  roof  of  the 
famed  drum-shaped  belvedere  which  crowns  the  sacred  pre- 
cincts of  the  Altars  of  Heaven,  and  to  catch  glimpses  of 
other  richly  painted  halls  and  pavilions. 

Peter  Kerr,  ambling  along  through  the  dust  and  dirt  on 
his  shaggy  mount,  was  quickly  struck  with  the  magnificence 
of  the  conception  of  these  two  temples,  to  which  are  sacrificed 
so  many  square  miles  of  space  within  the  limits  of  the  Outer 
city.  They  were  so  dignified,  so  sedate,  so  removed  from  the 
trivialities  of  the  modern  world,  that  to  bestow  adjectives 
on  them  seemed  to  him  like  painting  the  lily.  Nothing  could 
spoil  their  peculiar  beauty ;  nothing  could  equal  their  match- 
less setting.  They  were  still  what  they  were  originally 
intended  to  be — truly  divine.  In  those  early  days  of  a  decade 
ago,  it  was  still  possible  for  the  railway  traveller,  deposited 
so  unceremoniously  miles  beyond  the  gates,  by  entering  the 
great  capital  in  the  same  way  as  did  the  very  travellers  of  the 
days  of  Marco  Polo,  to  pick  up  point  by  point  the  princely 
Tartar-Chinese  idea  of  Imperial  Power  and  to  admire  the 
manner  in  which  everything  else  was  made  subordinate  to  it. 
This  indeed  was  the  city  of  the  emperors  of  the  most  popu- 
lous empire  in  the  world;  it  stood  unique  and  alone;  it  was 
celebrated  even  in  the  days  of  the  Persian  story-tellers,  for 
was  it  not  the  city  of  Aladdin  and  his  wonderful  Lamp? 
Even  though  dirt  and  dilapidation  now  struck  discordant 
notes,  those  notes  were  quickly  forgotten.  They  did  not 
really  matter;  they  were  inevitable  if  the  past  were  to  be 
preserved — if  endless  centuries  were  to  greet  one  in  their 
proper  barbaric  manner.  Here  heaven  and  earth  were 
ranged  opposite  to  one  another,  as  if  to  show  that  the  eternal 
spiritual  and  the  workaday  world  were  only  divided  by 
the  narrowest  boundaries  which  the  Emperor  in  his  sup- 


78  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

plications  could  easily  bridge.  The  way  in  which  everything 
was  here  ordered  was  unique.  It  was  audaciously  bold  but 
severely  orderly.  It  was  highly  imaginative  yet  eminently 
practical.  It  was  therefore  somewhat  different  from  any- 
thing in  any  other  part  of  the  world. 

Peter  Kerr  passed  as  in  a  dream  round  the  marble  bridge, 
which  crosses  no  waterway  but  has  merely  been  built  above 
the  roadway  so  as  properly  to  mark,  in  a  way  which  every 
Asiatic  at  once  understands,  the  path  of  imperial  progress 
from  the  palaces  within  the  Forbidden  City  to  these  august 
temples. 

Now  new  sights  greeted  him. 

For,  once  beyond  the  marble  bridge,  the  great  main  street 
of  the  outer  trading  city  suddenly  begins,  duly  heralded 
by  clumps  of  rude  blue  tents  which  have  invaded  the  open 
space  and  in  which  cheap  Jacks  display  their  varied  stocks. 
On  either  side  of  the  wide  roadway  there  were  now  ranged 
gaudily-painted  shops  and  warehouses  of  every  possible  design 
and  colouring.  Greens  and  golds  and  blues  and  reds  seemed 
mixed  in  the  crudest  way,  yet  somehow  harmonized  wonder- 
fully with  their  surroundings,  being  thrown  into  the  sharp- 
est relief  by  the  grey-brown  soil  and  the  blue-clad  people. 
Not  only  were  these  shop-fronts  distinctly  different  from  one 
another — some  being  of  one  design  and  some  of  another,  some 
made  in  one  colour-scheme  and  some  in  another — but  many 
were  set  off  to  still  greater  advantage  by  the  introduction  of 
fantastic  painted  poles  which  looked  like  Venetian  masts 
and  towered  high  above  the  low  roofs.  There  were  also 
curious  sign-boards — a  particular  product  of  this  northern 
clime — made  of  a  single  thick  plank  often  thirty  feet  long, 
locked  to  the  ground  between  massive  stone  supports  and 
rising  perpendicularly  so  that  the  great  painted  characters 
could  be  clearly  read  many  dozens  of  yards  away  by  every 
eye. 

The  dust-clouds,  which  had  almost  disappeared  along  the 
stoneway,  now  rose  in  Peter  Kerr's  nostrils  more  chokingly 
than  ever  and  even  half  obscured  his  view.  It  was  enough 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  79 

to  be  suffocated,  he  thought,  without  being  blinded.  Yet 
all  these  moving  crowds  of  horsemen  and  pedestrians,  and 
the  still  denser  lines  of  carts  filled  with  occupants  and  clat- 
tering quickly  one  after  the  other,  seemed  curiously  indiffer- 
ent to  an  inconvenience  which  must  set  the  stranger  sneezing 
and  coughing  in  an  ecstacy  of  discomfort.  The  traffic  moved 
on  impassively  in  unbroken  streams.  The  springless  carts 
rumbled  and  thumped;  the  ponies  and  mules  whinnied  and 
snorted;  the  people  talked  and  laughed.  The  dust — nobody 
noticed  it!  It  was  a  strangely  new  and  rough  world,  a 
world  apparently  living  in  peace  and  contentment  in  per- 
petual dust  which  was  only  reduced  to  muddy  subjection 
during  the  torrential  summer  rainy  season — a  strong,  hoarse- 
throated  world  reeking  of  the  camp.  Peter  Kerr,  seeking  for 
the  right  word  as  he  looked  around,  at  last  found  it.  It  was 
an  encampment,  that  was  what  it  was — an  encampment  built 
for  Tartar  conquerors  and  for  no  one  else.  The  camp-lines 
were  forever  perpetuated  in  the  stiff  military  fortifications  of 
the  double  city,  in  the  straight,  ruler-like  streets,  in  the 
canals,  in  the  moats,  in  the  watch-towers.  Perhaps  now 
it  was  only  a  city  of  refuge  for  a  dynasty  in  distress  because 
of  the  white-skinned  foreigner  who  was  menacing  the  whole 
coast-line  and  the  land-frontiers  as  well:  but  historically  it 
was  a  conqueror's  encampment,  the  headquarters  of  a  great 
military  system.  That  was  plain,  very  plain. 

For  above  the  low-lying  shops  could  be  seen  line  upon  line 
of  hills  and  mountains,  frowning  away  towards  the  west  and 
the  northwest  and  the  far  north.  The  setting  sun,  now  sunk 
behind  them,  threw  them  forward  as  a  new  key-note  to 
the  situation.  These  mountains  and  hills  masked  and  con- 
cealed those  boundless  steppes  in  which  had  arisen,  age  after 
age,  the  races  of  quick-moving  conquerors  who  from  those 
distant  times  when  the  defence  of  the  Great  Wall  of  China 
had  finally  broken  down,  had  cascaded  into  the  empire  and 
imposed  their  rule  on  a  nation  of  cultivators  and  traders. 
Never  was  a  thousand  years  of  history  plainer  than  on  enter- 


8o  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

ing  this  city  of  Peking.  Peking  and  the  mountains  within  its 
view  contained  almost  all  that  history. 

As  Kerr  and  his  guide  made  their  way  rapidly  forward, 
the  press  now  became  ever  greater.  Side  streets  were  empty- 
ing their  tributary  streams  of  men  and  carts  and  animals  into 
this  great  central  stream  which  flowed  with  such  mathe- 
matical straightness  towards  the  great  Central  Gate  of  the 
Inner  city.  The  din  and  the  close  packing  of  the  traffic 
became  more  and  more  marked,  and  more  than  once  Peter 
Kerr's  legs  were  menaced  with  summary  amputation  as 
carters  purposely  drove  their  heavy  wheels  into  his  pony 
in  order  to  push  him  aside. 

Every  moment  something  new  caught  his  attention.  Now 
there  were  lines  of  hoarse-throated  traders  standing  in  front 
of  their  shops  and  breaking  into  louder  and  louder  volleys 
of  cries  as  they  advertised  their  wares  and  sought  to  claim  the 
attention  of  passers-by.  Mostly  these  traders  were  big, 
heavy,  bronzed  men,  more  fit  physically  for  the  work  of 
Turkish  porters  than  for  such  shop-crying.  On  their  count- 
ers was  displayed  every  kind  of  thing — the  street  was  a  verit- 
able bazaar,  glinting  with  colour.  At  the  back  of  such  shops, 
seated  on  benches,  were  grave  signiors,  smoking  long  pipes  in 
solemn  conclave,  apparently  as  far  removed  from  the  anima- 
tion in  the  foreground  as  if  they  had  belonged  to  another 
world.  Yet  these  were  the  shop-masters,  listening  to  and 
watching  their  men  and  ready  to  abate  just  a  little  more  "the 
last  price  less  than  which  does  nowhere  exist."  To  Peter 
Kerr  it  appeared  as  if  he  were  among  the  innumerable  multi- 
tudes of  Vanity  Fair.  There  were  jugglers,  and  apes,  and 
shops,  and  puppet-shows,  with  their  crowds  of  buyers  and 
sellers  and  loungers,  jabbering  in  all  the  dialects  of  the 
empire ;  and  if  there  were  no  French  Row  and  Spanish  Row, 
at  least  the  towers  of  the  distant  city  had  appeared  in  the  dis- 
tance exactly  as  they  had  to  the  traveller  in  "Pilgrim's 
Progress." 

The  donkeyman,  afraid  in  the  growing  dusk  that  his  charge 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  81 

would  not  be  able  to  follow  him,  now  suddenly  reduced  his 
speed;  and  with  a  number  of  strange  cries  brought  his  little 
animal  alongside  the  pony  much  as  a  tug-boat  captain 
manoeuvres  under  the  lea  of  an  ocean-liner. 

"Man-man-ti"  he  said  with  a  broad  grin,  showing  what  he 
meant  by  hauling  on  his  own  bridle  and  making  the  hard- 
mouthed  donkey  walk.  "Man-man-tt"  he  repeated. 

"I  see,  old  fellow,"  replied  Peter  Kerr.  "You  mean  slow 
up  so  as  to  keep  together."  He  reined  in  too,  and  at  once  the 
donkeyman  gave  utterance  to  the  "hao-hao"  of  appreciation 
which  Peter  Kerr  had  already  assimilated.  He  was  begin- 
ning to  be  convinced  that  it  should  not  be  hard  to  get  along 
with  this  practical  people. 

It  was  as  well  for  them  to  go  slow,  for  the  great  towers 
of  the  Central  Gate  of  the  Tartar  city — the  celebrated 
Ch'ien  Men — now  loomed  up  very  near,  and  towards  this 
entrance  half  the  town  seemed  that  evening  to  be  journeying. 
Every  one  was  hurrying  along  at  the  fast  jog-trot  of  the  cart- 
mules;  it  seemed  almost  as  if  a  race  for  the  Inner  city  was 
taking  place.  Mixed  in  the  ordinary  town  traffic  were  dust- 
covered  cavalcades  which  had  plainly  come  from  very  far 
away ;  and  as  they  passed  under  a  decorative  Memorial  Arch, 
made  of  massive  timbers  coloured  vermilion  red,  a  glimpse 
was  had  of  fresh  multitudes  crowding  from  various  cross- 
roads towards  the  Inner  city.  These,  on  closer  scrutiny, 
proved  to  be  mainly  strings  of  pack-animals,  and  lines  of 
camels  bearing  coal  or  up-country  merchandise,  which  had 
entered  the  Outer  city  by  the  flanking  gates  of  the  west  and 
east  and  had  then  come  along  the  sandy  stretches  lying  imme- 
diately under  the  Tartar  Wall.  The  clanging  of  the  camel 
bells  and  the  anxious  shouts  of  the  drivers  seeking  to  keep 
their  teams  together,  now  added  new  and  distinct  notes 
to  the  general  noise.  It  was  as  if  all  were  madly  hastening 
to  lay  tribute  at  the  feet  of  the  Emperor.  As  the  hour  for 
the  closing  of  the  gates  was  now  so  close,  from  the  Inner  city 
there  issued  rival  streams  of  people  mostly  going  towards 
the  pleasure-quarter  of  the  capital,  a  quarter  rigorously  con- 


82  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

fined  to  the  commercial  or  Chinese  town,  and  which  resounds 
at  night  with  the  subdued  hum  of  discreet  debauch. 

These  new  streams  were  composed  of  quite  different  people, 
and  in  the  fast-falling  night  they  appeared  almost  unreal. 
Forcing  their  way  through  the  dust-laden  crowds  of  city 
plebeians,  camel  caravans,  and  horsemen,  and  all  this  other 
rough-and-tumble  working  world,  now  came  beautifully 
clean  Peking  carts,  hooded  in  rich  blue  and  red  cloth  and 
lined  with  pale  silks,  in  which  were  seated  both  men  and 
women,  dressed  in  striking  colours.  In  the  now  constant 
halts — when  all  this  heterogeneous  crowd  stood  jammed  in 
an  apparently  hopeless  block  of  shouting,  cursing  men  and 
restive  animals — Peter  Kerr  found  himself  sometimes  imme- 
diately alongside  some  of  these  conveyances  of  the  idle  rich 
of  the  dominant  Manchu  caste.  It  seemed  to  him  like  a  Far 
Eastern  rival  of  the  days  of  Beau  Brummel  and  the  dandies. 
The  women,  with  their  gorgeous  Manchu  head-dresses,  their 
painted  faces,  their  silk  robes  and  their  embroidered  satin 
waistcoats,  each  colour  more  audacious  than  the  next,  yet 
all  blending  in  carefully  studied  effects,  gazed  as  inquisitively 
at  the  Englishman  from  over  their  painted  fans  as  the  Eng- 
lishman gazed  at  them,  though  indeed  they  pretended  to  look 
away.  Sometimes  in  the  same  cart  were  two  or  even  three 
women  sitting  cross-legged  one  behind  the  other ;  whilst  num- 
bers of  retainers,  some  riding  and  some  on  foot,  accompanied 
and  kept  guard  over  them.  Close  behind  every  such  aristo- 
cratic conveyance  was  inevitably  an  old  duenna  or  two  in 
a  common  cart.  The  duty  of  these  cross- faced,  wizened  old 
creatures  was  to  stay  ever  near  their  mistresses  as  long  as 
they  were  abroad,  and  thus  to  save  them  from  falling  into 
temptation.  The  young  bloods  of  the  city,  many  as  brightly 
dressed  as  the  women  themselves,  instead  of  placing  them- 
selves back  in  the  body  of  their  carts,  as  did  the  women,  sat 
cross-legged  almost  on  the  shafts,  from  which  coign  of  van- 
tage they  were  both  relieved  from  the  rough  jolting  of  their 
springless  vehicles  and  were  able  to  ogle  the  beauties.  And 
thus  in  the  middle  of  two  conflicting  and  unending  streams 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  83 

— composed  of  the  gay  world  coming  out  and  meeting  the 
workaday  and  travel-stained  world  and  blending  with  it — 
the  donkeyman  led  Peter  Kerr  slowly  to  his  destination. 

At  length  they  reached  the  great  mediaeval  gates,  with  their 
mighty  ramparts  crowned  by  the  curious  and  historic  towers, 
in  each  of  which  there  is  room  for  scores  of  archers,  and  on 
which  are  painted  black  cannons'  mouths  to  frighten  the 
enemy.  Peter  Kerr  found  that  the  Outer  city  entrance  was 
a  mere  bagatelle  compared  with  this  one.  He  passed  through 
the  dark  tunnel  of  an  archway  which  pierced  the  fifty-foot 
wall,  full  of  wonderment,  only  to  find  himself  in  an  immense 
semicircular  keep  where  a  regiment  of  infantry  could  have 
bivouacked  without  incommoding  the  traffic.  No  wonder 
Marco  Polo  was  surprised  when  he  had  arrived  here  seven 
centuries  before;  no  wonder  nearly  all  Asia  had  once  bowed 
down  to  the  Son  of  Heaven  who  was  master  of  all  this. 
Never  in  olden  days  had  there  been  anything  devised  on  such 
a  scale.  The  walled  cities  of  history  became  trivial  things. 
In  this  great  open  well  between  the  double  gates  the  camels 
squealed  and  grunted;  the  mules  and  ponies  whinnied  dis- 
cordantly; men  cursed  and  called;  for  the  stream  fought  its 
way  from  a  standstill  into  motion  again  only  to  find  itself 
once  again  locked  to  a  halt  by  some  new  crush.  It  had  be- 
come slippery  again,  too,  for  once  more  stone  flags  marked  the 
way;  and  above  the  rattle  and  the  clank  of  the  heavy  cart- 
wheels could  now  be  heard  the  endless  ringing  of  iron-shod 
hoofs  which  struck  and  struggled  to  find  a  firm  foothold. 

Onwards  once  more,  and  then  one  more  tunnel-like  arch- 
way, above  which  was  yet  another  mightier  painted  wooden 
lou  or  tower;  and  at  last,  issuing  from  the  gloom  of  this  nar- 
row passage,  Peter  Kerr  saw  in  front  of  him,  shut  off  by  a 
white  stone  paling,  a  great  silent  courtyard,  and  then  be- 
yond that,  low-lying  but  massive  pink  walls  with  tight-shut 
gates.  He  needed  no  one  to  tell  him  what  it  was.  This 
was  the  Forbidden  City,  in  which  dwelt  the  heir  to  all  this 
Imperial  Power — and  his  mother,  the  masterful  Empress 
Dowager.  A  few  guards  in  soldier's  dress,  but  armed  only 


84  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

with  short  staves,  stood  lazily  in  the  middle  distance.  Other- 
wise there  was  nothing  to  denote  the  might  with  which  super- 
stition and  the  veneration  of  ages  invested  this  hallowed 
spot.  It  was  the  culminating  stroke,  thought  Peter  Kerr — to 
have  this  imperial  sanctuary  the  first  thing  to  strike  the  eye 
as  one  entered  the  Tartar  city.  There  it  was,  infinitely  im- 
pressive because  it  stood  sealed  and  silent  though  in  full  view. 
He  would  have  gladly  lingered  and  gazed  for  a  little  while 
longer. 

But  the  donkeyman  was  anxious  to  get  on  so  that  he  might 
return  home  before  it  became  quite  dark.  So,  touching  Peter 
Kerr's  knee,  he  quickly  went  ahead  once  more,  and  forced  his 
way  to  a  narrow  lane  which  dived  into  the  clusters  of  ugly 
low-standing  houses  almost  fringing  the  outer  courtyard  of 
the  Forbidden  City.  Miserable  half-naked  beggars,  lying  in 
wait  for  likely  benefactors,  now  suddenly  rushed  whiningly 
at  Peter  Kerr's  pony,  seeking  in  chorus  to  make  him  throw 
money  at  them.  He  waved  them  aside  and  hurried  on, 
sniffing  the  curious  new  odours  and  the  sudden  stenches  of 
the  narrow  lane  with  an  unappreciative  nose.  Mechanically 
he  followed  the  donkeyman  out  of  one  lane  and  into  another, 
always  called  on  by  the  donkey's  tinkling  bells.  Then  sud- 
denly they  reached  a  broader  street  lighted  by  some  kero- 
sene lamps.  The  donkeyman,  in  a  last  canter,  dived  across 
the  intervening  space  and  came  to  a  well-lighted  doorway. 
There  he  dropped  to  the  ground  and  pointed  vigorously 
through  the  doorway  with  an  excess  of  gesture.  This  was 
evidently  the  hotel. 


CHAPTER  II 

"A  vaincre  sans  peril,  on  triomphe  sans  gloire." 

CORNEILLE,  Le  Cld. 

KERR  dismounted  slowly,  after  he  had  watched  with  some 
curiosity  the  donkeyman  disappear  mysteriously  through  the 
massive  gateway  into  a  dark  courtyard.  He  was  a  bit  stiff 
from  this  jerky  ride  which  had  followed  his  long  spell  in  a 
railway  carriage,  and  he  was  not  sorry  to  stand  quiet  for  a 
few  minutes.  Yet  mentally,  in  spite  of  his  bodily  fatigue,  he 
felt  extraordinary  exhilaration.  The  hundred  miles  of  steel 
rails  leading  from  the  seaboard  to  the  metropolitan  railway 
terminus  had  been  a  slow  education  to  him  in  the  great  pos- 
sibilities of  this  strangely  new  yet  strangely  old  country;  his 
progress  through  the  capital  itself  had  suddenly  explained  to 
him  by  a  rough  and  rapid  illustration  in  men  and  things 
much  that  had  previously  puzzled  him  in  books  or  spoken  ex- 
planations. Indeed,  during  the  last  six  hours  he  flattered 
himself  he  had  really  learnt  more  than  in  his  six  months 
of  reading.  Here  was  the  land  of  his  dreams — a  land  of 
millions  and  even  hundreds  of  millions  of  people — a  vast, 
endless  land,  all  tilled  and  furrowed  from  end  to  end,  and  yet 
unprovided  with  any  of  those  inventions  which  were  now  so 
necessary.  Harness  these  millions  to  the  inventions — that 
was  all  that  was  needed!  Could  it  ever  be  done,  and  who 
would  do  it? 

Mechanically  his  brain  began  fitting  together  anew  pieces 
of  his  own  scheming  which  had  previously  been  something  of 
misfits.  He  understood  at  once  the  advantages  and  disad- 
vantages of  the  various  steps  he  had  either  already  taken 
or  had  mapped  out  in  advance.  He  admitted  to  himself  that 
the  vastness  of  the  whole  question,  considered  from  a  purely 
practical  point  of  view,  had  not  been  fully  understood  by 


86  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

him.  Yet  now  that  he  was  on  the  actual  battle-ground 
of  his  hopes  and  fears,  the  last  trace  of  his  indecision  left 
him.  At  least  he  was  beginning  to  understand.  The  brood- 
ing hours  he  had  spent  on  board  the  mail-ship  which  had  so 
slowly  crawled  from  little  England  over  the  great  expanse  of 
waters  washing  the  coasts  of  this  endless  Asia,  had  not  been 
wasted,  he  believed.  He  liked  to  think  that  this  necessary 
interval — this  suspense  before  the  play  began — had  been  con- 
sumed in  a  sort  of  solidifying  of  that  which  had  been  too  fluid 
within  him.  Perhaps  the  discipline  both  of  silent  reflection 
and  of  enforced  isolation  among  strangers  had  even  drilled 
out  of  him  a  certain  idle  dross.  Very  little,  he  reflected,  had 
really  prevented  him  at  the  eleventh  hour  from  allowing  him- 
self to  be  shackled  by  the  eternal  feminine. 

His  hurried  departure  had  not  permitted  him  to  do  more 
than  pen  short  and  hurried  farewells — no  matter  what  else 
he  might  then  have  wished  to  do.  In  his  heart  of  hearts  he 
believed  just  then  thoroughly  in  the  dictum  of  a  great  Eng- 
lish general  labouring  on  a  Herculean  task  of  reform  in 
another  sunburnt  land — that  work  in  far-off  places  can  only 
be  done  properly  by  men  who  have  no  mistresses  but  duty 
and  ambition.  Married  men  or  men  filled  with  visions  of 
domestic  bliss,  or  even  men  possessing  other  bliss,  were  men 
with  very  grave  disqualifications  for  energetic  work  in  such 
countries.  Their  hearts  could  not  be  in  their  work  if  their 
hearts  had  been  left  behind  them.  That  seemed  a  refresh- 
ingly obvious  reflection.  The  right  men  were  undoubtedly 
the  celibates — celibates  for  a  space  at  least — so  that  the  same 
unnatural  energy  which  had  distinguished  the  vigorous  and 
militant  religious  orders  of  old  might  be  theirs.  It  was  a 
question  of  driving-power  and  tissue.  Had  not  Bacon  writ- 
ten, "He  that  hath  wife  and  children  hath  given  hostages 
to  fortune,  for  they  are  impediments  to  great  enterprises, 
either  of  virtue  or  mischief"?  Spoken  aloud  the  opinion 
perhaps  sounded  a  trifle  absurd  to-day,  but  he  meant  to 
prove  it  correct.  With  all  his  energy  and  ambition  con- 
centrated on  his  task  no  obstacles  should  be  too  great.  Al- 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  87 

ready  the  keen  regrets  he  had  felt  at  hurrying  so  suddenly 
away  from  home  had  been  so  dimmed  that  he  had  almost 
forgotten  them.  Peter  Kerr  had  to  perfection  that  conve- 
nient capacity  for  unconscious  sophistry — that  mixing  of 
fallacious  reasoning — which  all  of  us  at  times  possess.  He 
thought  it  good  just  then  to  believe  in  "Dieu  et  mon  droit" 
in  the  way  that  Richard  the  First  did.  It  was  not  merely 
a  question  of  God  with  the  lion-hearted  king,  but  of  his  right 
hand  as  well ;  for  what  he  said  was,  "God  and  my  right  hand 
have  conquered  France."  Still  Kerr  should  have  known 
that  the  age  of  battle-axes  long  ago  passed  away,  and  that 
even  in  Asia  the  nimble  brain  has  supplanted  the  strong  arm. 
Those  who  rely  too  much  on  ancient  precepts  fare  badly  all 
over  the  world,  in  the  East  just  as  much  as  in  the  West. 
But  Kerr  had  that  to  learn. 

Idly  reflecting,  he  stood  on  the  quiet  street  waiting  for 
his  donkeyman  to  return.  It  was  curiously  peaceful  and 
restful  here  after  the  immense  bustle  and  clatter  of  the  city 
gates  and  the  humming,  seething  highways,  and  he  felt 
the  soothing  influence.  Also  he  quickly  noted  with  odd  sur- 
prise that  it  was  peaceful  in  a  way  somehow  different  from 
the  peacefulness  of  Europe.  He  could  not  account  for  it 
exactly  just  then.  Perhaps  it  was  because  the  smells  were 
different,  because  the  sounds  hung  strangely  in  the  air. 
Vague  echoes  of  camel-bells,  mixed  with  the  barking  of 
distant  dogs,  reached  him.  To  this  was  sometimes  added  the 
peculiar  clank- clank-ti- clank  of  heavy  cart-wheels  rattling 
sharply  on  their  massive  axle-trees,  as  a  great  rut  was  met  and 
overcome.  That  was  the  only  sign  of  their  progress,  for  the 
wheels  themselves  made  no  sound  as  they  ran  on  the  soft, 
dust-laden  roadways.  The  long-drawn-out  calls  of  street- 
sellers,  who  loitered  peacefully  along  in  distant  lanes,  were 
borne  to  him  dreamily,  at  irregular  intervals,  as  the  men  came 
gradually  nearer.  On  this  street,  however,  there  seemed  to 
be  not  a  soul — the  street  was  a  desert. 

Also  it  smelt  different — quite  different.  Mixed  with  the 
impalpable  dust,  which  teased  and  bit  the  nostrils,  was  the 


88  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

vague  impression  of  other  biting  things,  a  dust-dried  smell 
of  sun-baked  things  belonging  particularly  and  especially  to 
this  land.  He  could  not  define  all  this — only  instinctively 
he  noted  it.  United,  these  things  made  the  peculiar  evening 
peace — the  peculiar  atmosphere.  Perhaps,  he  thought,  the 
Chinese,  like  other  Asiatics,  were  inclined  to  make  noise 
when  they  put  forth  efforts  or  moved  quickly — that  is,  when 
they  worked  or  travelled — because  noiselessness  with  them 
must  be  inevitably  .associated  with  inaction ;  to  break  from 
inaction  into  action  made  it  necessary  to  employ  the  tonic  of 
noise. 

Unwilling  to  leave  his  pony,  he  at  length  peered  through 
the  dim  archway,  beginning  to  wonder  what  had  really 
happened  to  his  donkeyman.  He  had  been  gone  for  many 
minutes.  Was  the  hotel  already  sunk  in  sleep?  It  seemed 
a  very  small  and  original  type  of  hostelry,  and  anything 
would  be  possible.  The  silence  was  beginning  to  jar  on  him, 
when  fortunately  he  heard  a  loud  voice  drawing  near  and 
mixing  with  the  donkeyman's  gutturals.  He  went  forward 
a  little  from  the  shadow  in  which  he  was  standing,  and  called 
loudly.  It  somewhat  surprised  him,  after  his  satisfied 
thoughts,  to  hear  that  his  voice  was  peremptory  and  even 
angry — obviously  he  had  become  tired  of  waiting. 

Immediately  there  was  a  rush,  and  in  the  dim  lamplight 
he  saw  a  tall,  thin  man,  with  a  curious  cadaverous  face  and 
very  high  cheek-bones,  come  towards  him  with  rapid  strides. 
He  was  clothed  in  a  khaki  riding-suit  and  had  no  hat. 

"A  thousand  apologies,  sir,"  began  the  newcomer  In  rather 
florid  English,  showing  by  his  choice  of  expressions  and  his 
nonchalance  rather  than  by  his  accent  that  he  was  a  foreigner. 
"A  thousand  apologies  for  keeping  you  waiting,  but  this  fool 
told  me  first  that  you  were  here  waiting  for  me.  That  is  one 
of  the  inconveniences  of  the  Chinese  language.  Good- 
evening,  sir,  and  welcome."  And  with  this  he  held  out  his 
hand. 

Now  Peter  Kerr  elsewhere  would  have  certainly  objected  to 
shaking  hands  with  a  hotel-keeper  immediately  on  his  arrival, 


THE   HUMAN    COBWEB  89 

much  as  he  would  have  objected  to  shaking  hands  with  the 
head  waiter.  But  this  was  no  ordinary  hotel-keeper,  as  he 
was  soon  to  discover — and  he  was  ten  thousand  miles  from 
home.  So,  without  so  much  as  a  smile,  he  shook  hands  cor- 
dially enough;  and  it  was  then  forced  on  his  attention  that 
the  possessor  of  the  rather  cadaverous  face  had  uncommonly 
strong  fingers. 

"You  are  alone — quite  alone?"  continued  his  host,  peering 
out  on  the  roadway  as  the  donkeyman  led  the  pony  in,  as 
if  he  doubted  the  fact. 

"Yes,"  answered  Peter  Kerr  in  some  surprise,  "I  tele- 
graphed that.  Surely  you  understood." 

The  hotel-keeper  laughed  easily  and  made  a  sudden  ges- 
ture with  his  hands. 

"I  understood  that  you  were  a  single  man — but — "  he 
stopped  for  a  minute — "but,"  he  concluded,  "one  never 
knows." 

Peter  Kerr  gave  him  no  encouragement,  though  he  was 
somewhat  amused. 

"I  see  you  call  your  hotel  by  a  French  name,"  he  observed 
with  a  polite  show  of  interest  as  they  walked  indoors.  "Are 
you  a  Frenchman,  then?" 

"No  fear,"  came  the  easy  answer.  "I  am  a  Swiss,  though 
my  name  is  Carnot.  Perhaps  we  were  French  once,  a  long 
time  ago,  but  now  I  am  a  Swiss,  pure  Swiss.  And  I  take 
care  to  let  every  one  know  it  too,"  he  concluded  with  a  con- 
fident laugh. 

Peter  Kerr  wondered  what  might  be  the  methods  which 
this  easy-mannered  person  employed  to  advertise  his  nation- 
ality; he  concluded  it  must  be  his  brusqueness  and  his  demo- 
cratic contempt  for  ceremony  of  any  sort.  For,  as  they 
walked  along  the  hall  of  the  little  hotel,  Carnot  nodded 
familiarly  to  such  of  his  guests  as  happened  to  be  there,  and 
even  exchanged  with  them  some  chaffing  remarks  in  French. 
These  stared  with  open  inquisitiveness  at  Peter  Kerr,  and 
Peter  Kerr,  adapting  himself  quickly  to  this  new  atmosphere 
and  the  new  rules  of  life  he  was  picking  up,  stared  back 


90  THE  HUMAN   COBWEB 

with  interest.    There  were  some  curious  types,  he  observed ; 
the  hotel  must  be  peculiarly  international. 

His  host  led  him  up  a  narrow  flight  of  stairs  to  a  bedroom 
and  sitting-room  which  connected,  and  which,  after  the  rest 
of  the  hotel,  looked  refreshingly  clean  and  inviting.  The 
hall,  for  instance,  was  as  bare  of  all  comfort  as  a  barrack- 
room. 

"The  best  I  can  do  for  you,"  said  Carnot  with  his  easy 
familiarity,  waving  round  a  large  hand.  "It  was  lucky,  too, 
that  you  telegraphed  me  two  or  three  times,"  he  continued, 
"because  I  smelt  good  business  in  those  telegrams  and 
turned  the  people  who  were  in  here  out.  Otherwise " 

He  finished  with  another  wave  of  his  arms,  as  if  to  signify 
that  it  would  have  indeed  been  a  poor  outlook.  Carnot 
was  manifestly  an  independent  spirit;  Peter  Kerr  prepared 
to  meet  him  in  his  own  way. 

"Well,  this  is  first-class  anyway,"  he  said,  smiling.  "If 
you  continue  to  treat  me  so  well,  I  shall  be  your  eternal 
debtor." 

The  hotel-keeper  brushed  the  acknowledgment  aside  with  a 
careless  laugh.  He  was  obviously  seeking  for  another  open- 
ing yet  trying  to  restrain  himself. 

"Will  you  be  here  for  long?"  he  asked  at  last,  a  little 
significantly  twisting  a  big  bunch  of  keys  which  he  had  drawn 
from  his  pocket  round  his  fingers.  His  nonchalance  was  a 
mannerism,  Peter  Kerr  concluded;  he  wondered  what  he 
really  wanted  to  find  out. 

"Possibly  three  months,  possibly  four  months,  and  possibly 
even  five  or  six,"  he  answered,  studying  his  man  closely. 
"In  any  case  I  will  take  these  rooms  for  half  a  year  at 
once.  And  I  should  be  obliged  if  you  would  send  me  up 
my  bill  for  payment  in  advance,  so  that  at  least  you  will 
have  no  temptation  to  turn  me  out." 

"That  is  very  liberal,"  replied  Carnot  with  a  sudden  bow, 
an  undefinable  respect  creeping  into  his  manner  in  spite  of 
himself.  "That  is  very  liberal,  sir,"  he  repeated.  "I  am 
sure  I  shall  be  most  happy  to  do  all  I  can  for  you.  There 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  91 

is  only  one  other  gentleman  here  who  appears  a  long-stayer 
like  yourself — an  Italian.  There  are  two  or  three  others 
who  may  develop  with  time — but  one  never  knows.  It  is 
impossible  to  know.  Here  people  come  and  go  in  a  funny 
way.  There  was  once  a  man  who  stayed  for  two  years." 

"Oh,"  said  Peter  Kerr  carelessly,  "globe-trotters  mostly, 
I  suppose?" 

"No,"  replied  his  host  with  a  wink,  and  his  odd  familiarity 
uppermost  again,  "hunters  after  concessions — big  conces- 
sions." 

He  waited  a  minute  to  see  whether  the  Englishman  at  last 
would  show  his  hand.  But  Peter  Kerr  preserved  his  impas- 
siveness  and  gazed  thoughtfully  at  the  walls.  He  was  mar- 
velling more  and  more  at  this  strange  type  of  hotel-keeper; 
his  familiarity  with  English  was  exceptional  and  his  curiosity 
apparently  unending.  It  would  be  well  to  be  on  his  guard. 

As  he  stood  with  his  arms  swinging  carelessly  beside  him, 
the  Swiss  indeed  made  a  suggestive  figure.  He  was  like  a 
man  ready  to  clasp  anything  that  came  within  his  reach. 

"I  suppose  every  one  comes  up  here  with  an  object," 
remarked  Kerr  aloud.  "It  is  certainly  such  a  long  way  to 
come  that  one  could  not  very  well  drop  into  the  town  on  a 
casual  visit.  It  is  about  ten  thousand  miles  from  London." 

The  Swiss  was  swinging  his  keys  once  more  with  a  half- 
smile  on  his  face.  His  inquisitiveness  seemed  to  have  left 
him,  or  else  he  had  made  up  his  mind  to  adopt  temporarily 
a  different  attitude.  His  next  remark  pointed  to  that. 

"You  are  perhaps  thirsty,  sir  ?"  he  said,  more  civilly  than  he 
had  spoken  before.  "The  dust  is  very  bad  just  now." 

"Well,"  said  Peter  Kerr,  smiling  amiably,  "a  drink  is 
always  a  sound  idea.  Will  you  have  one  with  me  ?" 

"With  pleasure,  with  pleasure,"  cried  the  Swiss  in  his  odd 
voice,  very  loudly  this  time.  "What  is  it  going  to  be?" 

Peter  Kerr  laughed  in  spite  of  himself.  This  man  was 
irrepressible. 

"I  think  an  ordinary  whisky  and  soda  for  me." 

"Good." 


92  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

With  this  single  word  the  master  of  the  house  was  out  of 
the  room  with  a  bound,  and  rushing  down  the  stairs  three 
steps  at. a  time  he  loudly  shouted,  "Boy!"  Peter  Kerr  could 
not  resist  going  out  on  the  landing  and  glancing  down.  It 
was  rather  opportune  that  he  did  so ;  for  he  caught  a  glimpse 
of  a  swarthy  man  with  a  black  beard  come  across  the  hall 
and  stop  the  Swiss  in  his  headlong  flight. 

"Eh  bien?"  he  heard  the  man  with  the  black  beard  say 
interrogatively.  The  Swiss  laughed  a  little  and  spread  out 
his  arm  in  a  comprehensive  gesture. 

"Six  mois,  cash  in  advance;  probablement  concessions  tres 
importants.  Je  saurais  tout  plus  tard"  It  was  a  strange 
medley  of  French  and  English. 

Then  he  bounded  on  to  get  the  drinks,  whilst  the  black- 
bearded  man  walked  reflectively  away. 

On  the  landing  above  Peter  Kerr  stood  for  a  moment 
thinking  deeply  before  he  went  back  to  his  rooms.  He  was 
gradually  getting  his  new  proportions.  Evidently  the  great 
thing  to  realize  quickly  was  that  one's  own  particular  busi- 
ness was  every  one's  business.  That  was  an  essential  point. 
From  now  onwards  it  seemed  to  him  it  would  be  a  very 
complicated  game. 


CHAPTER  III 

"J'embrasse  m0n  rival,  mais  c'est  pour  1'etouf- 
fer." — RACINE,  Britannicus. 

PETER  KERR  soon  settled  down  in  his  new  quarters. 
Whether  he  settled  down  to  the  new  life  he  found  about  him 
is  more  open  to  doubt.  It  was  entirely  different  to  anything 
he  had  seen  before,  and  it  was  really  difficult  for  him  to  find 
his  bearings.  He  felt  sure  it  would  be  a  long  time  before 
he  was  acclimatized.  However,  two  days  after  his  arrival 
he  believed  that  he  had  taken  stock  of  the  situation  suffi- 
ciently well  to  send  home  to  those  who  were  anxiously 
awaiting  news  of  him,  his  first  cablegram.  It  was  short  and 
to  the  point.  It  merely  said,  "I  have  commenced,"  thereby 
implying  that  the  problem  was  being  attacked  by  him  in 
earnest. 

After  he  had  despatched  the  message,  he  thought  to  himself 
ironically  that  later  he  might  have  to  explain  that  its  real 
purport  was  that  he  had  commenced  to  realize  the  magnitude 
of  the  task  which  confronted  him.  Such  reasoning  was 
almost  Jesuitical:  still,  it  was  the  kind  of  reasoning  which 
circumstances  justified.  But  this  London  message  was  in 
a  measure  explained  by  three  other  telegrams  he  sent  to 
points  where  his  survey-parties,  which  had  started  from  home 
before  him,  were  already  collecting.  The  burden  of  these 
telegrams  was  merely  that  the  survey-parties  should  com- 
mence operations  at  once,  and  work  rapidly  on  the  plan  which 
had  already  been  decided.  Having  been  fully  instructed 
previous  to  their  sailing,  they  needed  only  to  be  unleashed 
by  these  telegraphic  orders  to  carry  out  their  part  of  the  game. 
And  so,  as  soon  as  he  had  received  confirmatory  replies, 
Peter  Kerr  concentrated  his  attention  on  the  situation  before 
him  with  grim  resolution.  It  was  indeed  no  joke. 


94  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

Now  that  he  was  on  the  spot  he  quickly  realized  that  the 
difficulties  to  be  overcome  were  really  immense,  and  that  the 
reserved  stand  taken  in  London  by  the  sceptical  Mr.  Charles 
Marten  was  rather  more  justified  than  he  would  care  to 
admit.  The  government  of  China  was  plainly  in  a  bad  way : 
there  was  a  lack  of  unity  in  this  government  which  was 
almost  unbelievable.  The  real  strings  of  power  seemed  to 
have  been  mysteriously  transferred  to  the  hands  of  a  few 
foreign  Ministers,  each  of  whom  was  eager  to  test  his 
ability  in  tripping  up  the  others  to  the  uttermost,  and  was 
indeed  exhausting  every  means  to  attain  that  satisfactory 
end.  This  meant  that  a  grave  difficulty,  having  really 
nothing  to  do  with  the  government  of  the  country,  would 
have  to  be  independently  overcome;  and  unless  he  was  able 
to  deal  with  this  difficulty  all  his  work  would  be  vain.  His 
scheme  might  be  the  very  best  in  the  world — that  is,  the 
cheapest,  the  most  businesslike,  the  most  scientific,  the 
most  satisfactory;  yet  that  would  not  alter  the  fact 
that  it  would  be  fought  tooth  and  nail  by  all  continental 
governments  merely  because  it  had  been  fathered  in  London. 
That  was  a  very  important  consideration.  Also,  because  it 
was  an  independent  scheme,  a  purely  financial  scheme  depend- 
ing for  success  on  its  own  merits,  it  was  by  no  means  certain 
that  the  British  government  would  ever  support  it.  And 
this  was  a  still  more  important  consideration. 

Especially  was  Peter  Kerr  surprised  by  the  remarkable 
position  Russia  now  held.  Viewed  at  close  range,  things 
looked  very  different  from  what  they  had  seemed  in  London, 
where  people  who  know  nothing  of  the  East  are  always  apt 
to  put  the  wrong  end  of  the  telescope  to  their  eyes.  The 
Port  Arthur  question  having  been  apparently  irrevocably 
settled  by  a  regular  convention  extorted  from  China,  people 
on  the  spot  already  believed  that  within  thirty-six  months 
Russia  would  have  a  couple  of  thousand  miles  of  railway 
built  in  the  Chinese  provinces  of  Manchuria,  and  that  this 
railway  invasion  would  be  continued  elsewhere.  Conse- 
quently there  appeared  to  be  serious  danger  of  a  complete 


THE  HUMAN   COBWEB  95 

Chinese  surrender  to  Russia.  General  Shaw,  the  old  Indian 
veteran,  was  right,  after  all,  thought  Kerr  irritably. 
Though  Germany,  ever  since  her  dramatic  seizure  of  Kiao- 
chow,  was  also  very  active,  her  activity,  when  viewed  on  the 
spot,  was  plainly  very  much  qualified  by  restrictions  which 
did  not  exist  in  the  case  of  the  great  northern  Power. 
Russia  was  geographically  so  splendidly  placed  that  all 
obstacles  now  seemed  matters  of  complete  indifference  to  her. 
Indeed,  she  seemed  to  be  constantly  pointing,  in  many  subtle 
ways,  to  her  geography  and  allowing  that  alone  to  convince 
high  Chinese  officials,  as  well  as  the  mysterious  Manchu 
Court  hidden  behind  the  impenetrable  Palace  walls,  of  the 
uselessness  of  opposing  a  natural  force  which  enveloped  half 
the  frontiers  of  the  Celestial  Empire  and  which  could  at 
will  fall  on  and  completely  crush  the  Chinese  colossus  just 
as  the  northern  barbarians  of  old  had  constantly  done. 

That  argument,  Peter  Kerr  allowed,  was  one  which  no 
amount  of  rival  diplomacy  could  discount — it  was  supreme, 
unanswerable;  and  now  that  he  was  on  the  actual  battle- 
ground where  so  much  epoch-making  history  was  being 
quietly  but  quickly  made,  he  could  properly  grasp  the 
nature  of  the  victory  Russia  had  actually  gained  by  the 
strange  withdrawal  of  the  small  British  squadron  from  the 
harbour  of  Port  Arthur  so  few  months  ago.  He  remembered 
with  peculiar  interest  the  dramatic  manner  in  which  this  act 
had  been  announced  in  far-off  London  at  that  dinner  when 
he  and  Sir  James  Barker  had  definitely  made  up  their 
minds  regarding  the  urgency  of  their  own  particular  scheme. 
It  was  this  Russia,  now  overshadowing  everything  to  such 
an  extent  in  Peking,  which  had  started  their  own  ball  roll- 
ing— which  had  really  given  them  their  own  impetus  and 
much  of  their  own  grand  idea.  To  Russia,  in  a  way,  they 
owed  everything. 

It  was  true,  as  Peter  Kerr  had  lately  found  out,  that  during 
the  past  forty  years  several  Englishmen,  not  to  speak  of 
Other  men,  had  had  almost  precisely  the  same  scheme  as  his, 


96  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

and  had  actually  attempted  to  perfect  it  so  as  to  make  it 
acceptable  to  the  authorities,  just  as  he  proposed  to  do. 

But  with  these  other  people  there  had  been  two  grand 
defects:  first,  that  the  times  had  never  been  ripe  for  such 
things;  and  secondly,  that  the  essential  part,  the  financial 
part,  had  never  been  properly  considered  and  arranged  for 
in  advance  as  had  been  done  in  his  own  particular  case.  As 
Barker  had  so  often  insisted  to  him  in  their  frequent  dis- 
cussions, everything  in  the  modern  world  was  really  a 
question  of  financing.  It  was  not  necessary  to  have  money 
of  your  own  in  large  quantities;  it  was  not  even  necessary 
to  have  any  money  at  all;  but  what  was  always  essential 
was  that  money  should  be  arranged  for  in  advance  so  that 
it  would  be  instantly  forthcoming  whenever  there  was 
something  tangible  to  offer  in  exchange.  That  was  the 
secret  of  modern  finance  in  a  nutshell.  With  that  condition 
fulfilled  there  was  nothing  which  could  not  be  hoped  for  or 
accomplished.  Therefore  Peter  Kerr,  fortified  by  the 
knowledge  that  he  was  in  any  case  far  better  prepared  than 
any  of  his  predecessors  had  been,  went  along  very  quietly, 
learning  all  he  could  and  planning  how  he  should  proceed. 
That  is,  he  engaged  interpreters  and  paid  a  number  of  formal 
visits,  and  listened  and  thought  and  made  a  vast  number  of 
notes  which  he  thought  would  be  useful  to  him. 

There  was  an  immense  amount  to  learn,  he  found,  not  so 
much,  perhaps,  in  really  new  things  as  in  new  arrangements 
of  old  things  and  in  puzzling,  heart-breaking  contradictions. 
He  had  truly  to  go  to  school  again.  The  Swiss  hotel-keeper, 
who  was  quite  willing  to  become  his  cicerone  at  various  odd 
moments,  explained  certain  minor  things  in  this  Peking 
world  with  laudable  brevity  and  cynical  frankness.  He 
said,  perhaps  hoping  that  one  confidence  would  invite  another, 
that  the  Chinese  loved  money  and  that  if  you  spent  money 
freely  amongst  them  you  must  ultimately  get  what  you 
wanted — absolutely  everything.  The  Swi:s,  also  at  various 
odd  moments,  hinted  that  be  was  the  confidant  of  those  who 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  97 

were  in  turn  the  confidants  of  the  hidden  powers  inside  the 
great  mysterious  pink  Palace,  and  that  in  China  all  things 
are  arranged  in  curious  ways — especially  such  novelties 
as  concessions.  To  which  Peter  Kerr,  for  the  time  being, 
only  good-humouredly  smiled,  perhaps  asking  his  host  in  the 
end  if  he  would  care  to  join  him  in  a  drink.  Later  on  he  dis- 
covered that  Carnot's  most  impossible  stories  were  mostly 
based  on  sober  facts,  and  that  it  was  absolutely  true  that 
some  of  the  most  extraordinary  things  had  really  been 
accomplished  by  rank  bribery  and  corruption,  and  that  there- 
fore the  most  humble  men  were  often  the  most  important 
factors  in  solving  a  difficult  problem.  But  that  was  very 
much  later. 

Just  then,  in  all  truth,  it  was  very  hard  for  him  to  know 
where  to  commence.  He  had  met  the  diplomatic  representa- 
tive of  his  own  country  and  had  told  him  vaguely  that  he 
was  on  a  mission  of  inquiry  regarding  railways.  Even  in 
those  days  there  were  beginning  to  be  so  many  people  of  this 
sort,  that  he  was  deemed  no  novelty.  He  had  found  his 
Minister  a  most  amiable  man.  He  was  tall  and  decidedly 
thin,  and  used  his  right  hand  freely  to  punctuate  his  periods 
in  a  rather  foreign  way.  He  assured  him,  somewhat  super- 
fluously, that  he  would  do  all  in  his  power  to  forward  his 
interests,  should  his  instructions  be  to  that  effect;  but  he 
added  significantly  that  the  present  times  were  not  very 
auspicious  for  concessionaires.  He  appeared  not  to  know 
all  he  should  regarding  people  at  home,  and  he  seemed 
nervous  lest  he  should  disclose  this  to  his  visitor.  In  other 
words,  he  did  not  seem  entirely  sure  of  his  own  ground  or 
of  his  own  position.  Still,  he  was  very  amiable  and  scrupu- 
lously polite. 

feter  Kerr  listened  carefully  to  what  was  told  him,  and 
then  marched  off  and  obtained  an  introduction  to  the  Russian 
Minister,  so  that  whilst  his  impressions  were  fresh  he  might 
juxtapose  the  respective  attitudes  of  these  two  men.  By  this 
he  hoped  that  he  might  learn  something  which  would  later 
serve  him  in  good  stead. 


98  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

He  was  very  much  surprised  with  the  Russian  Minister. 
He  appeared  to  be  a  most  peculiar  man,  irascible,  uneasy, 
dissatisfied.  He  talked  very  freely  to  Peter  Kerr,  stroking 
his  black  beard  all  the  while,  and  stretching  out  his  immense 
legs  as  if  they  were  unbearably  cramped  through  being  con- 
fined all  day  and  half  the  night  within  the  limits  of  a 
narrow  office — a  narrow  office,  which  was  the  real  key  to 
the  whole  problem!  His  knowledge  of  English  was  as 
surprising  to  Kerr  as  that  of  his  Swiss  host;  not  only  did 
he  talk  idiomatically,  but  he  had  a  peculiarly  illuminating 
slang  to  fill  in  gaps  of  his  conversation  which  few  Englishmen 
could  have  surpassed.  Also  he  was  very  blunt,  thus  upsetting 
Peter  Kerr's  preconceived  idea  that  Russians  are  inevitably 
smooth;  for  at  the  end  of  the  visit  he  suddenly  turned  on 
his  visitor  and  said: 

"And  now  what  is  your  business  in  Peking — what  is  your 
mission — mines  or  railways?" 

Peter  Kerr  laughed  in  spite  of  himself;  this  directness  was 
certainly  refreshing  after  what  he  had  experienced  elsewhere. 

"Well,  to  be  quite  frank,"  he  replied  good-humouredly,  "I 
am  after  any  concessions  I  can  get.  What  they  may  happen 
to  be  will  depend  upon  my  luck." 

After  that  for  a  while  they  talked  on  in  scraps,  as  men 
are  apt  to  talk  in  a  railway-carriage,  when  they  know  that  it 
is  a  question  of  minutes  before  they  will  have  to  part. 

The  Russian  Minister  smiled  a  trifle  grimly  when  he  got 
up  to  bid  him  farewell. 

"You  ought  to  be  a  diplomat,"  he  said  briefly,  "for  you 
fenced  my  questions  in  quite  an  old-fashioned  way.  We  of 
the  metier  have  long  given  that  up — at  least  we  say  so! 
However,  remember  one  thing — which  is,  that  as  soon  as  you 
show  your  first  card  here  in  Peking  your  whole  hand  will 
be  known.  It  will  be  common  gossip."  And  with  that  he 
let  him  go.  It  was  rather  kind  of  him  to  give  an  Englishman 
a  warning. 

After  this  visit  Peter  Kerr  began  to  be  infected  with  some 
despondency,  although  the  time  had  certainly  not  arrived  for 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  99 

anything  practical  to  be  done.  He  managed  to  meet  several 
high  Chinese  officials,  and  through  interpreters  who  talked 
volubly  but  somewhat  meaninglessly,  he  felt  his  way  as  best 
he  could  regarding  the  possibility  of  interesting  them  in  his 
proposals.  But  he  found  that  although  business  of  a  certain 
sort  was  to  be  done,  thanks  to  the  educating  influence  of  the 
many  persons  who  in  former  years  had  haunted  the  capital 
with  ready  cheque-books  in  their  hands,  what  he  proposed 
was  too  comprehensive  and  too  audacious  for  such  methods 
to  be  lightly  employed.  If  the  field  had  been  completely 
clear,  he  might  possibly  have  placed  himself  in  the  hands  of 
his  own  Minister,  and,  relying  upon  the  credentials  which  he 
carried,  enforced  official  co-operation. 

But  he  was  too  wise  to  attempt  that.  He  knew  that  Mr. 
Charles  Marten,  thanks  to  the  large  Asiatic  interests  he  rep- 
resented, could  demand  as  his  right  that  he  be  given  priority 
over  all  other  competitors.  Very  possibly  steps  had  already 
been  taken  to  prevent  Sir  James  Barker's  syndicate  from 
receiving  any  official  support.  It  was  quite  likely  that  this 
had  been  done :  for  higher  finance  in  one  important  particular 
resembles  love  and  war — all  is  fair  so  long  as  you  win  in  the 
end.  Kerr  wondered  at  times  whether  he  had  not  been  toe 
optimistic.  Still,  he  refused  to  admit  even  to  himself  that 
he  had  wished  to  bite  off  a  too  big  piece  of  this  rich  Chinese 
cake.  He  bided  his  time,  and  continued  to  write  up  a 
comprehensive  diary  whilst  gradually  making  himself  au 
courant  with  this  strange  new  world.  He  knew  that  pres- 
ently his  surveyors  would  be  sending  him  in  rough  surveys 
and  estimates,  which  would  allow  him  to  know  exactly  how 
much  he  could  afford  to  pay  in  cash  for  the  vast  concession 
he  sought.  And  then  he  hoped  that  in  the  course  of  a  few 
more  weeks  he  would  also  know  more  exactly  who  were  the 
proper  people  of  all  these  high  officials  of  Peking  to  treat 
with.  When  his  data  were  more  complete  he  would  try  a 
sudden  coup — that  was  his  attitude. 

So  meanwhile  he  bought  ponies  and  began  to  explore  this 
historic  city,  riding  in  a  hundred  different  directions  and  pick- 


ioo  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

ing  up  many  odds  and  ends  in  the  way  of  curios  from  men  in 
long  blue  coats  who  besieged  the  hotel  at  specified  hours, 
and  who  undid  their  blue-cloth  bundles  to  bring  forth  endless 
varieties  of  jade  and  porcelain  and  cloisonne  and  lacquer, 
and  other  things  both  beautiful  and  hideous. 


CHAPTER  IV 

"Je  pardonne  aux  autres  de  ne  pas  etre  de  mon 
avis,  mais  je  ne  leur  pardonne  pas  de  ne  pas 
etre  du  leur." — TALLEYRAND. 

THOUGH  it  soon  seemed  to  him,  in  spite  of  his  determina- 
tion not  to  be  discouraged,  that  things  were  not  moving  at  all, 
and  that  the  problem  was  becoming  more  and  more  discon- 
certing, slowly  new  elements  were  being  prepared  which 
would  lead  to  developments  he  little  suspected.  It  may  be 
here  prosaically  remarked  that  there  is  undoubtedly  such  a 
thing  as  Fate — different,  perhaps,  from  the  various  vulgar 
conceptions  of  it  which  have  always  existed  among  the  super- 
stitious, but  still  not  so  different  as  is  popularly  imagined. 
Without  believing  in  the  goddesses  Clotho,  Lachesis,  and 
Atropos,  one  may  safely  believe  that  the  birth,  life,  and 
death  of  men  is  part  of  a  scheme  practically  settled  in 
advance.  To  imagine  the  contrary  is  to  be  merely  a  bigot,  or 
else  the  experience  of  the  world  counts  for  nothing. 

Peter  Kerr  had  tried  to  preserve  a  distant  attitude  in  the 
little  hotel,  so  as  not  to  be  drawn  too  rapidly  into  intimacy 
with  those  whom  the  Swiss  picturesquely  designated  as  his 
permanents  or  semi-permanents.  But  it  needed  a  very  short 
time  to  break  down  this  reserve;  for  it  was  impossible  in 
such  a  small  community — which  was  really  nothing  but  a 
tiny  European  oasis  in  the  midst  of  a  great  and  barbaric 
desert — to  act  as  if  one  hid  within  one's  breast  some  tremen- 
dous and  possibly  criminal  secret.  The  easiest  way  obviously 
was  to  pretend  that  there  was  no  secret  at  all — that  one's 
business  was  really  very  unimportant.  And  this  was  the 
attitude  he  adopted  as  soon  as  he  had  seen  the  absurdity  of 
the  other. 

Still,   there  were   some  queer  types  at   the  hotel,   and   it 


jo*<          T:HE   HtTMAN   COBWEB 

seemed  to  him  well  to  be  on  his  guard  against  possible 
espionage  with  so  many  big  intrigues  going  on.  Locks  and 
keys  were  therefore  much  better  than  a  locked  mouth. 
People  had  already  told  him  strange  stories  of  the  manner  in 
which  men  in  this  capital  had  triumphed  over  their  rivals 
in  large  politico-financial  affairs;  and  though  possibly  many 
of  the  stories  were  arrant  lies,  they  were  interesting  and 
useful  as  warnings.  In  any  case,  whether  he  willed  it  or 
not,  having  been  allowed  for  a  short  space  to  look  at  things  so 
to  speak  from  the  outside,  he  was  suddenly  brought  into 
intimate  relations  with  his  immediate  surroundings  by  a  few 
small  incidents. 

At  the  next  table  to  his  in  the  informal  little  dining-room 
sat  the  selfsame  black-bearded  Italian  who  had  seemed  so 
curious  about  his  business  the  night  of  his  arrival.  For  a 
few  days  the  Italian  had  merely  watched  him  curiously,  as  if 
to  see  what  manner  of  man  he  was;  then,  one  morning, 
apparently  satisfied  with  this  study,  he  suddenly  nodded  to 
him  in  a  friendly  way  as  they  took  their  seats. 

That  evening  it  was  perhaps  not  merely  chance  which 
caused  Carnot  to  bring  the  Italian,  when  dinner  was  hardly 
finished,  several  bottles  which  he  placed  with  tender  care  on 
the  table.  As  soon  as  this  was  done,  with  a  wink  and  a  rude 
clack  of  the  tongue  the  Swiss  began  in  his  usual  loud  way: 

"Eh  bien,  Monsieur  Lorenzo,  voila  finalement  de  cette  fine 
champagne  qui  vous  a  tellement  plu.  Mais  qa  ete  le  vol  pur 
et  simple,  et  il  ne  faut  pas  trop  en  parler" 

Having  thus  announced  to  every  one  still  in  the  dining-room 
exactly  what  they  wanted  to  know,  Carnot  withdrew,  with 
nothing  more  than  a  careless  nod  from  the  Italian.  Doubt- 
lessly Carnot  received  his  proper  thanks  at  some  other  time : 
he  appeared  to  expect  nothing  further  just  now. 

Meanwhile,  Lorenzo  puffed  away  at  a  big  cigar  and  slowly 
undid  the  tissue-paper  covering  of  one  of  these  precious 
bottles.  As  soon  as  he  had  removed  the  paper,  he  read  the 
label  appreciatively.  This  label  apparently  afforded  him  so 
much  pleasure  that  some  minutes  elapsed  before  he  men- 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  103 

tioned  to  the  noiseless  boy,  who  was  looking  steadily  over  his 
shoulder  with  sheeplike  eyes,  that  he  needed  a  corkscrew. 
When  that  had  been  brought  him,  with  his  own  hands  he 
carefully  uncorked  the  bottle,  smelling  its  contents  with  a 
still  more  appreciative  smile.  There  was  indeed  an  appear- 
ance of  soft  joy  on  his  face  which  no  actor  could  have  sur- 
passed. It  was  quite  taking,  and  the  curiosity  of  his  servant 
became  intensified.  This  would  be  good  wine  to  steal! 

Peter  Kerr,  who  had  watched  this  elaborate  pantomime 
without  changing  a  muscle,  fully  expected  what  was  coming. 
He  was  not  disappointed.  The  Italian  looked  up  suddenly, 
and  catching  his  eye,  smiled  pleasantly  across  to  him. 

"May  I  offer  you  a  glass?"  he  inquired  very  civilly  in 
perfect  English.  "That  remarkable  rascal  Carnot  has  man- 
aged at  last  to  steal  a  few  bottles  for  me.  It  is  the  only 
drinkable  cognac  in  the  whole  of  Peking,  and  I  discovered 
its  existence  just  a  week  ago.  I  will  tell  you  about  it  in  a  few 
minutes." 

His  manner  was  so  remarkably  easy  and  friendly  that  no 
one  could  have  refused  him. 

"It's  very  kind  of  you,"  said  Peter  Kerr  at  once,  making 
as  if  he  would  rise,  "I  shall  be  most  happy."  He  pushed 
back  his  chair  a  little. 

"No,  no,  don't  trouble,"  said  Lorenzo  protestingly.  "If  you 
will  allow  me,  I  will  come  and  join  you."  And  not  waiting 
for  an  answer,  he  carried  the  bottle  as  well  as  two  little 
glasses  which  he  had  mysteriously  acquired,  across  to  Kerr's 
table.  Then,  seating  himself,  he  filled  the  little  glasses 
with  elaborate  care,  and  handing  one  to  the  Englishman,  he 
raised  the  other  to  his  lips. 

"To  ourselves,"  he  said  gravely.  "And  also  to  the  genius 
who  procured  the  bottles." 

He  sipped  the  cognac  carefully  with  the  air  of  a  connoisseur. 
A  peculiar  appreciation  soon  stole  into  his  bright  eyes.  This 
time  there  was  no  acting:  his  palate  was  evidently  most 
deliciously  tickled. 


104  THE    HUMAN    COBWEB 

"It  is  certainly  remarkably  good,"  ventured  Peter  Kerr, 
who  really  did  not  care  for  cognac. 

"No  brandy  as  good  as  this  can  ever  have  come  to  China 
before,"  the  Italian  rejoined  solemnly.  He  spoke  as  if  he 
were  adjudicating  on  a  matter  of  the  highest  importance. 
Then  he  gazed  steadily  at  the  long-necked  bottle  as  if  it 
entranced  him. 

"It  is  genuine  cognac,  worth  anything  a  bottle  in 
France,"  he*  continued  after  a  few  minutes.  "It  cannot  be 
bought;  it  can  only  be  stolen." 

"Carnot  can  be  a  very  useful  person,  then,"  said  Peter  Kerr 
smilingly.  The  conversation  had  not  yet  fallen  into  an  easy 
channel,  and  he  was  not  sure  whether  several  people  across 
the  room  were  not  watching  them  now  with  highly  interested 
eyes. 

"Carnot  is  a  great  man,"  rejoined  Lorenzo,  leaning  over 
and  speaking  quite  confidentially,  so  that  no  one  else  could 
hear.  "He  can  do  almost  anything.  I  am  sure  he  employs 
the  biggest  rascals  in  the  town." 

It  was  easy  to  see  that  the  man  was  in  a  talkative  mood — - 
that  he  had  many  days*  energy  stored  up  to  expend  now — 
if  the  occasion  warranted  it.  And  so  Peter  Kerr,  with 
nothing  in  the  world  to  occupy  him,  save  perhaps  to  go  as  a 
last  resource  to  the  little  Club,  and  there  to  handle  news- 
papers and  magazines  almost  two  months  old,  leant  back  con- 
tentedly in  his  chair  and  blew  reflective  clouds  of  smoke  into 
the  air.  The  opening  was  not  unpromising:  perhaps  he 
would  learn  a  great  deal  of  minor  importance. 

"And  what  do  you  think  of  Peking  now  that  you  have  been 
here  nearly  a  week — that  is,  six  days?"  continued  the  Italian, 
openly  inquisitive.  It  could  not  have  been  for  nothing  that 
he  had  kept  such  an  exact  count  of  the  days.  Kerr  noted 
the  fact  at  once  with  some  curiosity.  Promptly  he  prepared 
to  be  picturesque  rather  than  political. 

"I  think  it  is  a  wonderful  place  in  many  ways,  and  the 
most  wonderful  thing  of  all  is  that  it  must  be  almost 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  105 

exactly  what  it  must  have  been  when  that  illustrious  country- 
man of  yours  came  here  six  centuries  ago." 

"My  countryman?"  echoed  Lorenzo,  looking  somewhat 
puzzled.  His  shirt-cuffs  had  slipped  far  out,  and  Kerr  noted 
that  his  links  were  over-elaborate  with  turquoise  and  chased 
gold. 

"I  mean  Marco  Polo — the  traveller  of  travellers." 

"Ah!"  said  the  Italian  a  little  vaguely,  sitting  up  straight 
and  pushing  back  his  cuffs  after  regarding  them  tenderly. 
Possibly  he  had  forgotten  who  Marco  Polo  was,  or  else 
it  simply  was  that  he  had  no  sympathy  for  the  English  mania 
of  remembering  dates,  authorities,  and  personalities  and 
making  endless  conversation  round  them. 

"It  is  very  wonderful,  perhaps,  but  also  very  dirty,"  he 
went  on  after  a  short  pause,  returning  quickly  to  modern 
actualities.  "Imagine,  for  instance,  what  it  would  .be  like 
if  there  was  not  this  hotel!  Yet  a  few  years  ago  there  was 
none,  and  our  predecessors  in  the  concessionnairing  market 
must  have  had  a  happy  time  in  Chinese  inns." 

As  he  finished  he  looked  lazily  across  the  table  through 
half -closed  eyes.  Manifestly  he  had  an  object  in  view  which 
he  proposed  to  attain  as  speedily  as  possible.  He  did  not 
even  think  it  worth  while  dissimulating.  It  was  cool. 

But  Kerr  could  appear  singularly  unemotional  when  he  so 
wished;  now  he  determined  not  to  notice  the  reference 
which  placed  him  and  his  interlocutor  on  the  same  slow  road. 
But  perhaps  the  Italian  would  soon  put  a  question  point- 
blank:  he  wondered  how  he  had  better  take  that  if  it  came. 

"The  Chinese  inns  may  be  pretty  bad,"  he  remarked  aloud, 
as  if  he  had  only  noticed  that  reference,  "but  a  man  was 
telling  me  yesterday  that  when  Gordon  came  up  here  some 
years  ago  to  say  farewell  to  China  he  actually  stayed  for  a 
number  of  days  in  a  common  inn  in  the  Chinese  city — the 
Outer  city — so  as  to  avoid  people." 

"Ah!"  said  the  Italian  vaguely  a  second  time,  opening  his 
eyes  wide,  and  then  letting  the  lids  drop  again.  Perhaps 
he  did  not  recollect  the  name  of  Gordon:  perhaps  he  was 


io6  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

purposely  stupid.  In  any  case,  it  was  plain  that  he  wished 
to  keep  the  conversation  strictly  under  his  control.  He  now 
leant  forward  and  slowly  refilled  the  little  glasses,  at  the 
same  time  puffing  quickly  at  his  cigar.  The  rings  of  smoke 
he  blew  from  his  mobile  mouth  hung  heavily  in  the  dry,  hot 
air  of  the  dining-room  and  formed  fantastic  designs  which 
appeared  to  fascinate  him. 

"I  have  been  here  four  months,"  he  said  at  length,  resuming 
the  conversation  at  the  point  that  pleased  him,  "and  the  place 
bores  me.  Frankly,  if  it  were  not  for  my  business  I  would 
not  stay  another  day.  I  am  certain  I  should  get  curious — 
eccentric,  you  call  it,  do  you  not? — if  I  stayed  another  year. 
But  I  shall  not  stay  another  year.  In  two  months  my 
business  will  be  finished — quite  finished.  I  speak  honestly." 

He  stopped  suddenly  and  looked  squarely  at  Peter  Kerr. 
If  he  had  been  given  the  slightest  opening  he  would  have 
undoubtedly  taken  it  just  then ;  but  Kerr  was  still  singularly 
unresponsive  and  sat  quietly  with  his  chin  in  his  hand.  It 
was  impossible  to  say  what  he  was  thinking  about. 

The  Italian,  foiled  a  second  time,  gave  a  short  laugh,  as  if 
the  amusing  side  of  this  curious  duel  had  just  struck  him. 
He  looked  at  Kerr  once  more :  Kerr  had  not  moved. 

"Madonna  santa!"  he  murmured  under  his  breath.  Then 
he  laughed  again.  It  was  so  plain  that  he  was  laughing  at 
the  stubbornness  which  he  was  encountering,  that  Kerr  won- 
dered at  his  effrontery.  But  the  Italian  was  a  clever  man. 
He  had  been  within  an  ace  of  becoming  angry.  Now  he 
speedily  recovered  himself  by  dissimulating.  He  flicked  a 
finger  quickly  in  the  direction  of  the  dining-room  door, 
out  of  which  the  last  people  had  just  gone. 

"I  was  laughing  at  the  funny  people  at  this  funny  hotel," 
he  remarked  with  transparent  duplicity.  "Have  you  noticed 
them  ?  What  a  queer  collection  to  be  gathered  together  in , 
such  a  place!  Carnot  tells  me  that  we  comprise  six  nation- 
alities— five  British,  three  French,  two  Belgians,  one  Ger- 
man, one  Italian,  and  one  American,  total  thirteen,  which 
is  an  unlucky  number." 


THE    HUMAN    COBWEB  107 

"Are  there  so  many?"  rejoined  Peter  Kerr,  showing  sudden 
interest,  yet  secretly  wondering  how  this  would  be  turned. 
"There  do  not  appear  to  be  even  a  dozen  rooms  in  the  whole 
hotel;  there  are  certainly  never  more  than  eight  people  in 
the  dining-room,  if  one  excludes  Carnot  and  his  wife.  I 
have  counted  them  often." 

The  Italian  laughed  softly,  as  if  now  he  were  amused  at  the 
Englishman's  innocence.  His  laugh  was  singularly  musical, 
for  he  had  a  rich  voice — but  it  ended  as  suddenly  as  it 
began.  He  did  it  rather  curiously,  as  if  laughter  was  a 
thing  to  finish  with  quickly — an  unnecessary  thing,  a  mere 
temporary  convenience.  Now  he  began  talking  in  staccato 
sentences,  which  showed  his  nationality  more  than  his  accent. 

"Have  you  never  noticed  before  in  hotels  that  many  people 
prefer  not  to  appear  in  public?  Well,  in  this  queer  inn  it  is 
much  the  same  thing.  There  are  four  people  who  certainly 
never  appear,  if  they  can  help  it.  I  will  enlighten  you. 
First  there  is  a  Frenchman  and  his  wife;  second,  there  is  an 
Englishman  and  an  English  lady.  There  is  nothing  very 
curious  about  the  first  two,  excepting  that  the  husband  is 
very  small  and  very  ugly  and  that  therefore  I  detest  him. 
As  for  the  other  two,  they  are  certainly  the  two  most 
curious  characters  in  the  world.  The  Englishman  is  tall 
and  lanky  and  very  polite — he  is  what  would  be  called 
anywhere  very  distingue]  the  Englishwoman  is  small  and 
quick,  wears  short  skirts,  and  has  short,  curly  hair  like  Rosa 
Bonheur.  When  he  rides,  she  runs  alongside  like  a  dog. 
Is  that  good  or  not?  To  see  them  like  that  is  one  of  the 
most  extraordinary  sights  in  the  world.  Also,  they  say  she 
tvears  a  golden  snake  round  her  waist  underneath,  as  a  last 
cash  reserve.  Even  Carnot  does  not  quite  understand  them; 
they  are  the  most  remarkable  he  has  seen  in  ten  years.  They 
amuse  me." 

The  cosmopolitan  Italian  laughed,  quite  satisfied  with  him- 
self. He  could  be  very  good  company  when  he  chose  to  exert 
himself,  and  now  with  an  excellent  cognac  to  help  him  along 
and  with  a  very  special  object  in  view,  he  speedily  forgot  his 


io8  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

first  irritation.  Apart  from  two  or  three  dining-room  boys 
clad  in  their  sober  blue  coats,  they  had  the  place  absolutely 
to  themselves.  The  servants  were  noiselessly  removing  plates 
and  glasses  and  at  the  same  time  conducting  an  animated  dis- 
cussion in  whispers,  full  of  strange  gutturals  and  hissing 
sibilants,  through  a  trap-door  with  unseen  persons  in  the 
pantry.  They  might  as  well  have  belonged  to  another  planet. 

"Well,"  Lorenzo  said,  more  familiarly  than  hitherto,  "you 
will  know  as  much  about  these  people  as  I  do  when  you  have 
been  here  six  months.  One's  business  does  not  occupy  one 
overmuch  in  this  place;  waiting  for  these  excellent  Chinese 
officials  to  realize  the  importance  of  one's  proposals  is  the 
principal  affair.  Thank  fortune  I  am  several  stages  ahead 
of  you ;  in  two  months  I  shall  certainly  be  gone.  I  shall  not 
be  sorry." 

Peter  Kerr  shifted  his  position  and  glanced  keenly  across  the 
table.  Lorenzo's  was  not  a  bad  face,  though  the  eyes  were 
quick  and  rather  cunning.  He  suddenly  made  up  his  mind 
that  he  might  as  well  learn  at  once  what  he  could. 

"Do  you  believe  that  it  is  really  only  a  question  of  waiting?" 

A  gleam  of  satisfaction  shot  across  the  Italian's  face. 
Instead  of  answering  at  once,  however,  he  took  up  the  bottle 
of  cognac  again  and  helped  himself  to  a  fourth  little  glass. 
The  Englishman  had  not  yet  finished  his  second. 

"It  is  a  question  of  waiting  and  paying,"  he  said  with  com- 
mendable brevity,  when  he  was  ready,  pressing  his  lips 
together  in  a  queer  way  after  each  sentence  had  been  con- 
cluded. "Let  us  come  to  the  point.  I  feel  very  much  like 
being  frank  to-night.  I  will  be  exact  with  you.  I  have 
spent  nearly  all  my  cash  in  accomplishing  my  end — about 
£8,OOO — and  I  calculate  that  this  sum  may  just  do.  My 
concession  when  it  is  forthcoming  may  be  worth  a  quarter  of 
a  million  to  me.  But,"  he  concluded  apologetically,  "mine 
is  only  mining — nothing  but  a  little  mining.  Railways,  for 
instance,  cost  a  fortune.  With  my  eight  thousand  I  would 
have  done  nothing  in  that  direction.  Oh,  no."  He  threw  up 
a  deprecating  hand  and  shook  his  head. 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  109 

Peter  Kerr  once  more  glanced  keenly  at  him. 

"What  do  you  call  a  fortune  here,"  he  inquired — "fifty 
thousand  pounds,  a  hundred  thousand — more?" 

"More — perhaps,"  replied  the  Italian  with  rising  emphasis. 
Once  more  he  brought  his  lips  together  in  the  same  peculiar 
way.  Then  he  leaned  across  the  table  and  placed  one  hand 
on  the  sleeve  of  Peter  Kerr's  coat. 

"Excuse  me,"  he  said,  "shall  we  talk  straight — quite 
straight?  I  know  what  I  know  from  hard  experience,  and 
though  I  say  it  myself,  you  may  trust  me.  I  have  been 
buying  my  experience  month  after  month.  You  may  help 
me  later  on — in  London.  I  can  help  you  here.  I  have 
many  ideas  and  many  methods.  What  do  you  say  ?  You  are 
a  man  of  intelligence — you  must  understand  that  special 
methods  are  necessary — that  it  is  useless  to  act  as  in  Europe." 

"Well "  Peter  Kerr  uttered  this  single  word,  only  to 

hesitate  and  have  nothing  more  to  say.  The  English  have 
been  perhaps  the  last  people  in  the  world  to  settle  their 
business  even  with  their  familiars 'in  the  new  way — that  is, 
out  of  their  offices.  When  it  comes  to  dealing  with  a  stranger 
in  strange  surroundings,  in  spite  of  themselves  they  always 
exhibit  open  distrust. 

Peter  Kerr  was  no  exception  to  this  rule.  Though  he  had 
almost  come  to  the  point  when  he  was  forced  to  admit  to 
himself  that  he  did  not  begin  to  see  how  he  should  act  to 
make  his  great  venture  feasible,  the  very  idea  of  placing  any 
part  of  it  at  the  mercy  of  another  man  was  distasteful  to  him. 
Whilst  any  way  out  of  the  general  impasse  which  he  found 
in  Peking  was  not  yet  to  be  discovered,  he  did  not  know 
whether  this  man  could  really  help  him  or  not. 

So  he  sat  there  frowning  to  himself  in  dead  silence  and  in 
great  doubt,  as  oblivious  to  the  Italian's  existence  as  if  he 
had  been  out  of  the  room.  Lorenzo,  on  his  part,  quite  con- 
tent with  what  he  had  done,  impassively  puffed  his  fat  cigar 
and  bided  his  time.  In  any  case  he  had  broken  the  ice;  the 
rest  could  wait. 

What  Peter  Kerr  would  have  actually  done  if  he  had  been 


no  THE   HUMAN  COBWEB 

forced  to  reply  there  and  then,  must  remain  an  unanswered 
question.  Possibly  he  would  have  avoided  committing 
himself  definitely  and  begged  for  time.  But  as  it  happened, 
just  then,  following  a  sudden  slamming  of  the  outer  hall 
doors,  came  the  quick  run  of  feet;  and  almost  instantly  a 
curious  girl-like  little  woman  stood  framed  in  the  dining- 
room  doorway.  She  paused  there  for  a  moment,  standing 
on  the  tips  of  her  toes  and  glancing  vaguely  into  the  room. 
By  some  strange  chance  she  missed  the  two  men,  now  sitting 
so  silently  at  their  corner  table,  and  seeing  only  one  or  two 
of  the  Chinese  servants  still  working  in  their  fitful  manner, 
she  suddenly  made  up  her  mind  and  ran  blithely  across  to 
where  stood  an  old  piano.  In  an  instant  she  had  seated 
herself  before  the  instrument  and  began  running  her  fingers 
up  and  down  the  keys  in  a  ripple  of  music.  It  was  a  very 
providential  interruption. 

The  Italian  had  at  first  begun  to  mutter  furiously  to  him- 
self; then,  when  he  realized  that  they  had  not  been  seen 
and  that  this  was  an  experience  out  of  the  common,  he  sud- 
denly checked  himself  and  quietly  twisted  round  in  his  chair. 
It  would  in  any  case  only  be  a  matter  of  a  few  minutes — and 
he  was  by  nature,  like  all  Latins,  very  inquisitive  and  curious 
about  everything  in  the  world.  So  he  prepared  to  enjoy 
himself.  From  the  manner  in  which  he  acted,  one  might 
have  thought  him  in  the  stalls  of  a  theatre. 

"The  Englishwoman  of  the  Englishman,"  he  whispered  to 
Peter  Kerr. 

Her  playing  had  changed  from  its  first  hesitation  into  the 
opening  of  a  song.  Now  in  a  small  but  sweet  voice  she  began 
singing: 

"If  in  the  great  Bazaars 
They  sold  the  golden  stars, 
Beloved,  there   should  be 
A  necklace  strung  for  thee " 

And  just  then  hasty  footsteps  suddenly  sounded  in  the  hall 
once  more,  and  a  tall,  thin  man  came  quickly  into  the  dining- 
room. 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  in 

"Elsie,  Elsie,"  he  called  remonstratingly,  "I  wondered 
where  you  had  got  to  when  I  missed  you.  Elsie,  remember 
this  is  a  public  room;  any  one  might  come — you  have  your 
own  piano.  Elsie,  I  must  ask  you — I  beg  your  pardon " 

The  tall,  thin  man  coloured  to  the  roots  of  his  hair  as  he 
suddenly  became  aware  that  he  was  being  observed  with 
special  interest  by  the  two  men  seated  silently  at  their  table. 
He  fidgeted  for  a  moment  with  his  tie,  hardly  knowing  what 
to  do. 

"Elsie,"  he  began  once  more,  "are  you  aware  that  you  are 
not  alone?  Are  you  aware -" 

The  curious,  girl-like  woman,  with  her  fingers  still  softly 
touching  the  piano-keys  and  her  back  to  the  room,  was 
oblivious  to  what  was  passing  behind  her. 

"Jack,"  she  cried,  without  turning  her  head  and  still 
playing  the  refrain,  "you  are  a  bother  to-day,  a  regular 
nuisance.  I  am  sick  of  being  cooped  up,  and  I  like  this  ever 
so  much  better."  And  running  her  fingers  down  the  keys, 
she  began  singing  again,  this  time  with  all  the  strength  of 
her  lungs,  so  as  fitly  to  breathe  her  defiance. 

"If  I  could  buy  the  mist 
By  Dawn's  pale  lips  kissed " 

The  tall,  thin  man  paused  with  such  tragic  despair  written 
on  his  face,  that  Lorenzo  suddenly  and  spontaneously 
laughed.  It  so  happened  that  his  laugh  came  at  a  pause  in 
the  music,  and  his  full  voice  sounded  for  an  instant  so 
clearly  that  inevitably  it  caught  the  ear  of  the  singer.  At 
once  she  stopped  with  a  jerk,  slammed  down  the  piano,  and 
wheeled  round  on  her  stool.  There  she  sat  motionless  for 
a  moment,  looking  into  the  room.  It  was  impossible  to 
say  whether  she  was  very  angry  or  only  rather  surprised. 
Peter  Kerr  noticed  that  she  had  curious  big  blue  eyes — her 
eyes  immediately  attracted  attention. 

"Oh,"  she  said  at  last,  getting  up  and  sauntering  into  the 
middle  of  the  room  carelessly,  "I  am  awfully  sorry  if  I 
bothered  you  with  my  noise.  I  didn't  know  anybody  was 


ii2  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

here.  Jack,"  she  cried,  "why  didn't  you  let  me  know? 
Jack,  how  stupid  we  all  are  to-day!" 

The  unfortunate  tall,  thin  man,  so  diffident  and  so  polite 
in  his  manner,  was  covered  with  further  embarrassment. 

"But,  Elsie,  I  did  tell  you,"  he  protested.  "Elsie,  I  wanted 
you  to  stop.  I " 

He  probably  would  have  gone  on  if  any  one  had  paid  any 
attention,  but  the  little  woman  had  walked  a  little  nearer 
to  the  two  men,  who  had  now  apologetically  risen  from  their 
seats. 

"Oh,"  she  said  suddenly,  "it  is  Mr.  Lorenzo.  Excuse  me, 
Mr.  Lorenzo,  for  not  knowing  you  before.  Carnot,  the 
great  Carnot,  speaks  to  me  constantly  of  you.  He  has  a 
great  opinion  of  you." 

The  Italian  bowed  deeply.  He  was  a  little  at  a  loss  how  to 
act,  though  not  at  such  a  loss  as  Kerr. 

The  tall,  thin  man  fingered  his  blond  moustache  in  the 
same  despair;  if  an  opening  had  been  vouchsafed  him  he 
would  have  doubtless  begun  his  furtive  protests  anew.  But 
no  attention  was  paid  to  him.  His  companion  had  seated 
herself  near  the  two  men,  whilst  she  smiled  vaguely  at 
nothing  in  particular.  Men's  embarrassment  very  often 
contributes  materially  to  the  enjoyment  of  women.  It  is 
like  iron  or  arsenic — good  for  the  system. 

"I  feel  stupid  to-night,"  began  the  little  woman.  "Peking 
has  got  on  my  nerves.  It  is  such  a  curious,  old-world  place, 
and  one  is  so  isolated." 

She  sighed,  and  passed  her  fingers  thoughtfully  through  her 
curly  hair. 

"Jack,"  she  continued,  resuming  her  onslaught  suddenly, 
without  turning  her  head,  "don't  be  stupid  too,  and  above 
all  don't  look  miserable.  I  can  see  you  are  miserable  without 
looking  round.  I  feel  bad  enough  myself  without  having 
that  to  worry  me.  Jack,  order  some  Pommery — a  big 
bottle — and  let  us  all  have  a  drink  together.  Let  us  be 
merry.  I  am  sure  you  will  join  me,"  she  concluded,  turning 
with  a  smile  to  the  two  men.  She  had  a  gracious  little 


THE   HUMAN    COBWEB  113 

manner  of  her  own — when  she  took  the  trouble  to  give 
attention  to  what  she  was  doing.  Otherwise  she  was  curi- 
ously distraite,  as  if  she  hardly  noticed  that  there  were  other 
things  in  the  world  besides  herself. 

The  two  men  murmured  something  unintelligible,  and 
waited  to  see  what  happened  before  moving.  Lorenzo's 
interest  had  already  evaporated.  Since  the  interruption  had 
come  exactly  at  the  wrong  moment,  he  did  not  relish  the 
idea  of  having  to  make  conversation  about  nothing  in  par- 
ticular. As  for  Peter  Kerr,  he  was  wondering  what  the 
proper  etiquette  might  be  under  these  peculiar  circumstances. 
Perhaps  the  tall,  thin  man  might  get  angry,  and  then  it 
would  be  singularly  awkward. 

Fortunately,  the  servants,  with  Oriental  phlegm,  solved 
the  problem.  Since  it  was  the  most  natural  thing  in  the 
world  that  these  strange  outlanders  should  act  just  as  the 
mood  seized  them,  they  merely  pushed  two  tables  together, 
brought  glasses  and  began  pouring  out  the  sparkling  wine. 

"Come,  Jack,"  said  the  queer  little  woman  gaily,  "sit  down 
and  be  sociable.  This  is  Mr.  Smith,"  she  said  by  way  of 
introduction  to  the  Italian  and  Peter  Kerr  as  she  lifted  her 
glass  to  them. 

None  of  the  three  seated  themselves  at  once,  and  tall,  thin 
Mr.  Smith,  to  relieve  the  embarrassment,  took  from  his 
pocket  a  cigarette-case  on  which  Lorenzo's  quick  eyes  dis- 
cerned an  unmistakable  gold  coronet.  Mr.  Smith  offered 
its  contents  in  the  same  deferential  manner  that  he  did 
everything,  and  finding  that  nobody  wished  to  smoke  his 
cigarettes,  he  finally  replaced  the  case  in  his  pocket  with  a 
little  sigh. 

"Shall  we  sit  down?"  he  said  resignedly. 

"What,  not  smoking,  Jack?"  chided  the  little  woman.  "We 
must  cheer  up.  This  will  never  do." 

Her  fingers  deftly  extracted  the  case  from  his  pocket  once 
more;  she  took  out  two  cigarettes,  and  putting  one  between 
her  lips,  handed  him  the  other. 


ii4  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

"Now,"  she  said,  "let  us  attempt  .to  enjoy  ourselves,  even 
if  we  dismally  fail." 

For  a  while  they  debated  the  charms  of  curio-collecting  and 
wondered  whether  most  of  the  things  in  the  town  were 
modern  frauds.  But  though  they  managed  to  do  a  good  deal 
of  talking,  there  was  no  real  conversation,  and  when  the 
Pommery  came  to  an  end  they  ^parted  with  far  more  enthusi- 
asm than  they  had  talked. 


CHAPTER  V 

"La   miit  tous   les  chats   sont   gris." 

French  Proverb. 

AFTER  bidding  good-night  to  this  ill-assorted  trio,  Peter 
Kerr  came  very  slowly  and  thoughtfully  up  the  somewhat 
primitive  little  hotel  staircase.  Though  Lorenzo,  just  before 
leaving  him,  had  attempted  to  return  to  the  charge  with 
his  offer  of  co-operation,  Kerr  had  evaded  giving  any  defi- 
nite undertaking  with  the  excuse  that  he  must  give  the  whole 
matter  thought.  Now  he  was  no  longer  thinking  of  this 
business  matter;  his  mind  had  sped  thousands  of  miles 
away.  An  acute  sense  of  loneliness  had  for  some  reason  sud- 
denly stolen  over  him;  a  sense  of  isolation,  of  unenviable 
exile — and  this  made  him  remember  things  he  thought  he 
was  forgetting.  The  French  understand  so  well  this  heart- 
searching  and  heart-aching  of  exiles  that  they  name  it 
une  inquietude  de  deracine — which  is  an  admirable  way 
of  expressing  a  difficult  matter.  The  poor,  uprooted 
tree,  if  it  could  only  tell  us  its  thoughts,  would  cer- 
tainly make  us  weep.  Perhaps  that  is  why  nature 
has  not  given  to  all  living  things  the  power  of  speech,  know- 
ing well  that  man — the  master  of  all — has  already  his  full 
burden  to  carry  from  his  own  sorrows,  without  listening  to 
the  sorrows  of  all  those  that  are  dumb  though  they  may 
suffer  immensely. 

Peter  Kerr  did  not  know  why  he  should  feel  like  that. 
Possibly  his  mood  had  been  induced  by  the  various  trivial 
incidents  of  the  evening;  incidents  which,  notwithstanding 
their  triviality,  when  linked  together  formed  a  chain  of 
things  all  crudely  suggestive  of  his  present  impotence — of 
having  become  a  mere  shuttlecock  to  be  beaten  here  and 
there  by  the  battledores  of  fate.  Certainly  the  attitude  of 


ii6  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

the  Italian — and  the  manner  in  which  he  had  cynically  dwelt 
on  the  fact  that  to  employ  time-honoured  methods  would  be 
labour  lost  here — had  made  a  powerful  impression  on  Peter 
Kerr's  mind;  for  his  mind  was  quite  ready  for  that  impres- 
sion. Equally  certain  was  it  that  the  diffident  gentleman, 
who  had  followed  in  such  a  weak,  protesting  way  the  little 
whirlwind  of  a  woman  with  the  strange  eyes  as  if  he  had 
been  only  a  straw  sucked  along  after  her,  seemed  emblematic 
of  the  manner  in  which  all  things  moved  here.  Somehow 
that  had  jarred  him  very  much.  Everything  was  different — 
very  different  to  what  he  was  accustomed  to.  Lorenzo  was 
evidently  right.  In  this  far-off  world  it  was  a  question  of 
being  able  to  meet  new  conditions  by  rough-and-ready 
methods;  of  being  able  to  translate  strange  texts  with  the 
aid  of  stranger  interpreters;  of  finding  solutions  in  almost 
mediaeval  ways.  Just  then  nothing  about  this  pleased  him. 
He  disliked  the  outlook  intensely;  for,  not  being  a  poor 
man,  he  did  not  have  to  shut  his  eyes  to  many  things  which 
poor  men  cannot  afford  to  see.  What  a  pity  England  was 
really  such  an  immense  distance  away !  It  was  like  thinking  of 
another  planet — a  planet  from  which  he  had  cut  himself 
off  of  his  own  free  will.  Had  he  been,  say,  only  two  or 
three  thousand  miles  away  instead  of  ten  thousand,  a  tem- 
porary retreat  would  have  been  possible.  Now  retreat 
would  mean  defeat  and  nothing  else.  .  .  . 

From  this  it  will  be  gathered  that  Peter  Kerr  stalked  into 
his  bedroom  in  a  very  moody  frame  of  mind.  Quite 
mechanically  he  turned  up  the  lamp  which  his  methodical 
Chinese  boy  had  left  ready  for  him.  Then  he  paused 
irresolutely. 

What  should  he  do?  On  looking  at  his  watch  he  found 
that  it  was  past  midnight ;  and  still  the  night-sounds  of  this 
barbaric  town,  which  spread  so  mightily  within  its  great 
ramparts,  were  stealing  through  his  open  windows  in  little 
puffs  and  gusts  of  uneasiness.  The  city  seemed  a  sleepless 
city.  The  curious  clatter-rattle  of  the  heavy-wheeled  carts 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  117 

on  the  soft  road  beneath  his  windows  was  slowly  coming  to 
an  end;  but  the  distant  barking  of  dogs,  which  is  such  a 
feature  in  a  city  where  every  house  has  its  guardian  cur,  still 
continued  unabated,  as  if  all  manner  of  evil  things  were  going 
on  in  deserted  lanes.  There  must  be  many  people  afoot,  he 
thought,  or  else  the  dogs  would  not  bark.  The  monotonous, 
long-drawn-out  cries  of  the  sellers  of  night-cakes — men 
engaged  in  vending  their  wares  almost  until  dawn — echoed 
romantically  and  mysteriously  in  the  still  atmosphere,  sug- 
gesting yet  other  things.  Occasionally,  too,  some  one  passed 
immediately  under  his  windows  singing  in  the  curious,  nasal 
falsetto  of  the  East,  and  interrupting  this  cadence  at  unex- 
pected places,  only  to  begin  after  each  such  pause  with 
renewed  ardour.  Such  singing  was  to  frighten  the  evil  spirits 
away.  Because  the  hotel  itself  had  become  quite  quiet,  these 
outer  noises  fell  all  the  sharper  on  his  ear.  They  seemed  to 
advertise  the  sleeplessness  of  night.  In  the  hotel  compound, 
the  watchman's  bamboo  rattle,  beaten  faintly  through  the 
courtyards  in  a  peculiar,  quick  tick-tack,  and  more  loudly  in 
long  beats  when  the  man  passed  out  on  to  the  street,  had 
begun  to  play  as  it  would  play  all  night.  Apart  from  the 
watchman's  rattle,  in  the  hotel  itself  it  had  become  almost 
oppressively  quiet,  with  that  hollowness  of  silence  which 
is  sometimes  more  jarring  to  the  nerves  than  noise. 

Peter  Kerr,  having  prepared  himself  for  bed,  lighted  a 
cigar  and  looked  idly  for  a  book.  He  wished  to  distract  his 
attention;  to  be  carried  away  by  some  enchantment  from 
his  present  surroundings.  He  would  like,  when  he  went  to 
sleep,  at  least  to  imagine  that  he  was  not  where  he  was — 
that  he  had  flown  away.  A  good  book  might  do  that  for 
him;  and  so  he  tried  to  select  a  likely  volume  from  the 
stack  on  his  table. 

He  had  placed  his  hand  on  the  lamp  in  order  to  adjust  it 
for  his  reading,  when  a  peculiar  sound  made  him  pause  and 
prick  his  ears.  He  stood  motionless  for  a  bit,  puffing  at  his 
cigar  and  closely  listening.  Then  an  expression  of  surprise 


ii8  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

crossed  his  face.  Without  a  word,  slowly  and  cautiously  he 
began  turning  the  lamp-wick  down,  so  that  the  arc  of  light 
gradually  diminished  until  at  length  the  room  became  quite 
dim.  He  waited  until  he  had  almost  turned  the  light  out 
before  moving;  then,  feeling  his  way  by  means  of  the 
chairs  and  tables,  he  passed  from  his  bedroom  to  his  sitting- 
room  and  then  on  to  the  verandah,  which,  after  the  manner 
of  the  East,  ran  completely  round  the  house  to  give  protection 
to  the  outer  rooms  from  the  beating  rays  of  the  fierce  summer 
sun.  Afterwards  he  wondered  why  he  had  acted  in  that 
particular  way. 

The  night,  though  not  very  dark,  was  not  clear  enough  to 
throw  much  light  on  the  situation.  But  his  ears  were  of 
more  value  than  his  eyes.  Here  on  the  verandah,  as  he  stood 
stock-still,  there  was  no  doubt  about  it  at  all.  His  first 
surmise  had  been  correct.  Somewhere,  not  far  off — indeed, 
very  close  to  him — a  woman  was  gently  crying  to  herself. 
He  could  even  distinguish,  between  her  stifled  sobs,  vague 
muttered  words.  For  a  moment  he  thought  that  this 
might  be  the  strange  little  Englishwoman  of  whose 
existence  he  had  that  evening  so  suddenly  become  aware. 
Something  had  happened.  That  high  rebellious  mood  in 
which  she  had  been  had  given  place  to  the  inevitable  reac- 
tion— and  tears.  Already  he  had  begun  to  arrange  the 
scenario  of  a  little  tragedy,  with  the  irresolute  man  suddenly 
become  brutal  and  harshly  dominating  the  situation,  when  he 
recollected  that  Lorenzo  had  told  him  that  these  people  had 
rooms  downstairs.  He  was  jumping  at  absurd  conclusions. 
His  own  unconscious  sciomachy — his  fighting  with  shadows — 
was  making  him  unduly  imaginative.  A  sudden  revulsion 
of  feeling  seized  him  and  he  even  began  to  go  back.  Then 
fresh  sounds  caught  his  ears — and  he  stayed.  He  was  not 
really  anxious  to  read  a  book,  he  thought. 

He  was  able  soon  to  decide,  from  the  occasional  creaking  of 
a  cane  chair,  that  whoever  this  person  might  be,  not  more 
than  twenty  or  thirty  feet  of  space  divided  them.  Curiosity 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  119 

gained  him  more  and  more.  Presently,  as  all  the  vague 
night's  sounds  entirely  ceased  for  a  moment,  he  made  out 
some  muttered  words  in  French. 

At  once  he  jumped  to  a  fresh  conclusion.  This  time  he  was 
fully  persuaded  that  it  must  be  correct.  It  must  be  the 
wife  of  the  mysterious  Frenchman  who  never  appeared. 
Kerr  suddenly  felt  disappointed.  There  had  probably  been 
a  quarrel,  and  after  the  manner  of  women,  the  wife  was 
seeking  consolation  in  tears.  Peter  Kerr  certainly  did  not 
feel  in  that  quixotic  mood  which  impels  one  to  assist  people 
in  distress.  In  any  case,  there  was  the  man  to  be  con- 
sidered— and  the  man  would  keenly  resent  his  intrusion,  no 
matter  what  the  lady  said. 

He  was  turning  to  go,  satisfied  with  this  philosophy,  when 
he  heard  the  cane  chair  suddenly  creak  violently.  Then 
there  was  a  hard  thud  and  a  low  cry,  followed  by  the 
sound  of  a  fall.  What  the  deuce  had  happened? 

"Confound  it!"  he  said 'under  his  breath,  this  time  in  sheer 
annoyance  because  he  was  so  puzzled  and  perplexed.  Yet 
after  a  brief  pause  he  stepped  forward  resolutely  and  called 
quite  loudly.  There  was  absolute  silence.  In  any  case  she 
must  be  alone  just  now.  Otherwise 

"That  settles  it,"  he  muttered,  quickly  forgetting  all  his 
previous  reasoning ;  and  match-box  in  hand  he  now  advanced 
cautiously  down  the  verandah  until  he  judged  that  he  cov- 
ered the  distance.  Then  he  struck  a  match.  In  the  sudden 
flare  of  light  he  saw  lying  a  few  yards  from  him,  motionless 
on  the  floor,  a  woman.  Beside  her  there  was  a  cane  long- 
chair.  There  was  nothing  else.  He  could  not  understand 
what  had  happened. 

The  match  blew  out,  but  he  had  measured  the  distance, 
and  in  a  few  steps  he  had  reached  the  prostrate  form  and 
was  bending  down.  Another  match  showed  him  a  little 
trickle  of  blood  running  down  a  white  face.  Abandoning 
his  match,  he  gathered  the  prostrate  woman  resolutely  up  in 
his  arms  and  rapidly  retraced  his  footsteps.  This  was  much 
more  serious  than  he  had  supposed.  Setting  his  burden 


120  THE  HUMAN  COBWEB 

unceremoniously  on  the  floor  of  his  sitting-room,  he  fetched 
the  lamp  and  turned  the  light  up.  It  surprised  him  to  see 
that  his  hand  was  not  quite  steady.  He  had  certainly  become 
a  little  excited. 

The  blood  had  flowed  more  quickly  with  the  movement  of 
carrying,  and  now  formed  an  ugly  patch  down  her  face  and 
neck  and  even  on  to  her  clothes.  With  the  aid  of  a  jug  of 
water  and  a  towel  he  wiped  away  these  ugly  stains  as  well  as 
he  could  and  traced  the  flow  of  blood  to  its  source.  There 
was  a  small  but  deep  cut  just  above  the  temple,  he  found; 
and  whilst  he  carefully  smoothed  back  the  hair  he  looked 
at  her  pallid  face.  With  quick  fingers  he  now  ripped  a 
handkerchief  in  two,  and  soaking  one  part  in  water  he  had 
soon  made  a  bandage  which  he  secured  over  the  wound. 
Then  he  seized  a  whisky  flask  in  the  same  rapid  way,  and 
half  corking  the  bottle  with  a  finger,  he  let  the  spirit  drop 
between  her  lips.  He  hadn't  an  idea  whether  this  was 
right  or  not,  but  it  seemed  the  best  he  could  do.  He  sud- 
denly remembered  that  in  such  cases  it  was  also  customary 
to  loosen  things ;  but  when  a  woman  is  in  a  loose  kimono  it 
is  embarrassing  to  know  where  to  commence.  So  he  stayed 
his  hands,  after  an  ineffective  investigation.  She  would 
certainly  come  to  suddenly,  and  he  did  not  want  to  appear 
unduly  officious. 

To  his  irritation,  he  found  his  calculations  once  more  go 
astray.  Judging  by  the  sound  in  her  throat  the  spirit  cer- 
tainly choked  her — yet  she  did  not  revive.  He  vaguely 
remembered  that  burning  feathers  was  an  ancient  remedy 
well  spoken  of;  but  unfortunately  he  certainly  had  no. 
feathers  in  his  rooms.  In  semi-despair,  he  took  a  bottle 
of  eau  de  Cologne,  and  deluging  another  handkerchief  with 
its  contents  deliberately  he  laid  it  across  her  mouth  and  nose. 
That  should  be  enough  to  raise  a  dead  person.  He  watched 
with  the  eye  of  a  daring  experimentalist.  Yes! 

She  had  made  two  or  three  sudden  movements  with  her 
arms,  and  now  plucked  frantically  at  her  face  with  her 
long,  thin  hands. 


THE  HUMAN  COBWEB  121 

"Ah,  non,  non"  she  cried.  Half  rising,  in  her  agitation 
she  pulled  the  handkerchief  sharply  away.  Kerr  dropped  on 
his  knees  and  assisted  her  to  a  sitting  position  with  one  arm, 
whilst  with  the  other  he  attempted  to  keep  the  bandage  in 
place. 

"How  do  you  feel?"  he  said  with  assumed  cheerfulness, 
feeling  for  some  reason  very  much  of  a  fool. 

Her  eyes  blinked  confusedly  in  the  bright  light,  as  if  she 
did  not  understand;  then  suddenly  she  came  completely  to 
herself. 

"Quest  ce  quil  a?"  she  cried,  pulling  away  and  looking 
round  in  open  alarm.  "What  is  it?  Who  are  you?"  she 
continued  in  English.  "What  have  you  done  to  me?" 

Her  bosom  began  to  heave  tumultuously. 

"I  am  sorry,"  began  Peter  Kerr  penitently,  releasing  his 
hold  and  standing  up.  "I  am  sorry,  but  I  found  you — 
lying  on  the  verandah,  and  as  there  was  nothing  else  to  do 
I  had  to  bring  you  in  here  to  see  what  was  the  matter." 

He  wondered  why  he  should  feel  that  it  was  all  his  own 
fault. 

"Yes,  but  what  have  you  done — what  have  you  done?" 
she  exclaimed  as  she  felt  the  bandage  round  her  head,  and 
at  the  same  time  caught  sight  of  the  blood-stained  towel  on 
the  floor.  "Look!"  She  pointed  an  accusing  finger  at  the 
towel. 

With  sudden  irritation  Peter  Kerr  picked  it  up  and  flung 
it  out  of  the  room.  This  had  been  an  evening  of  many 
events. 

"The  problem  is  not  as  complicated  as  it  may  appear  to 
you,"  he  said  severely — "that  is,  if  you  could  give  me  a  few 
seconds  to  explain " 

"But  how  is  it "  She  hesitated  and  coloured,  began 

again,  and  stopped  once  more.  She  was  looking  at  him — 
looking  with  resentful  eyes.  Peter  Kerr  coloured  too — but  it 
was  from  righteous  anger. 

"I  am  extremely  sorry,"  he  began,  turning  away  and  then 
crossing  his  arms  defiantly.  "It  is  true  that  I  am  not  dressed, 


122  THE   HUMAN    COBWEB 

for  the  very  good  reason  that  I  do  not  go  to  bed  in  my 
clothes."  He  could  not  help  smiling,  but  he  quickly  checked 
himself.  "You  will  pardon  my  mentioning  that  I  was  just 
going  to  bed — that  if  it  had  not  been  for  you,  I  should  now 
perhaps  be  sound  asleep.  It  was  because  I  heard  somebody 
fall  heavily  that  I  went  out  and  found  you  lying  on  the 
verandah  with  your  head  cut  and  bleeding " 

"What,  cut  and  bleeding!" 

She  had  left  the  rest  unnoticed. 

"Well,"  replied  Peter  Kerr  in  matter-of-fact  tones,  "you 
saw  that  towel  yourself.  If  you  feel  your  head  care- 
fully  » 

Instantly  her  hands  were  busy  with  the  bandage.  From 
her  lips  bubbled  a  stream  of  half-suppressed  exclamations. 

"Be  careful,"  uttered  Peter  Kerr  warningly,  in  spite  of 
himself,  knowing  that  the  bleeding  would  very  easily  com- 
mence again.  "Let  me  help  you,"  and  coming  forward  he 
assisted  her  to  her  feet.  But  having  done  that  he  at  once 
fell  back  to  a  discreet  distance.  He  was  still  feeling 
offended. 

"You  have  been  very  kind,"  said  his  companion  after  a 
brief  pause,  looking  at  him  with  gratitude,  and  still  holding 
her  head.  He  saw  that  her  eyes  were  hazel  brown  and 
soft,  and  his  indignation  suddenly  evanesced.  He  inclined 
his  head. 

"I  am  sorry  if  I  was  rude,"  continued  the  lady,  as  if 
talking  relieved  her  feelings,  "but  you  will  forgive  me,  I 
am  sure." 

"I  have  nothing  to  forgive,"  began  Peter  Kerr.  "I  am 

sure  that "  She  stopped  him  before  he  could  go  any 

farther. 

"No,  I  was  rude,  I  know,  but  then  I  was  unhappy,  very 
unhappy,  and  this  has  greatly  shaken  me." 

She  coloured  once  more  and  then  looked  down.  Peter 
•Kerr  did  not  wonder  so  much  now.  It  was  rather  a  quaint 
situation. 

"It  resembles  vaguely  the  parable  of  the  Good  Samaritan," 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  123 

he  said  cheerfully,  trying  to  adopt  an  impersonal  attitude. 

"The  story  in  the  Bible,  you  mean?"  she  said,  suddenly 
closing  her  eyes.  Her  pallor  had  begun  to  return,  and  he 
became  alarmed  at  the  prospect. 

"Of  course,"  he  answered,  talking  against  time  and  sin- 
cerely hoping  that  she  was  not  going  to  fall;  "the  com- 
parison is  pretty  poor,  for  in  the  Bible  it  was  a  man  who 
was  rescued  half  dead  because  he  had  fallen  among  thieves. 
I  only  had  to  walk  along  a  verandah  and  fetch  a  towel  and 
some  water.  Are  you  going  to  faint  again,  do  you  think?" 
he  ended  suddenly. 

She  shook  her  head  slowly. 

"No,"  she  said  in  a  low  voice.  "I  shall  be  better  in  a 
minute — much  better." 

He  pushed  forward  a  chair,  and  she  sat  down  gratefully. 
Leaning  her  head  on  her  hands  she  sat  motionless,  her  brown 
hair  tumbling  down  her  back,  her  kimono  gracefully  draping 
her  slim  figure.  Kerr  watched  her  without  a  word. 

It  was  the  clock  on  his  mantelpiece  which  aroused  them 
both.  After  a  loud  preliminary  whirr  it  suddenly  struck 
one  o'clock.  The  lady  opened  her  eyes  and  looked  up 
inquiringly. 

"One  o'clock,"  said  Peter  Kerr. 

"What,  one  o'clock?"  she  echoed  quickly.  She  gathered 
the  folds  of  her  Japanese  dressing-gown  about  her  as  if  she 
would  go. 

"Perhaps,"  he  began  tentatively,  "I  had  better  fix  that 
bandage  for  the  night.  I  have  some  rather  good  stuff  for 
cuts.  A  little  would  do  a  world  of  good,  and  help  the 
healing.  Shall  I  get  it?" 

He  watched  her  as  she  felt  her  head  with  a  little  grimace 
of  pain. 

"Will  it  hurt?"  she  inquired,  smiling  at  him  with  her 
hands  still  up  to  her  head.  The  bandage  ma.de  a  sort  of 
coif  oddly  becoming  to  her,  he  thought. 

"Hurt!  Certainly  not,"  he  responded,  with  unmistakable 
decision.  "It's  only  ointment,  you  know.  It  will  draw  the 


124  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

skin  together,  and  in  two  or  three  days  it  should  be  all  well. 
May  I?" 

He  did  not  wait  for  an  answer,  but  picking  up  the  lamp, 
walked  with  it  to  his  bedroom.  He  set  it  down  on  a  table 
near  the  door  and  began  rummaging. 

The  ointment  was  hard  to  find,  it  appeared;  for  when  he 
had  finally  traced  it  to  its  hiding-place,  the  lady  stood 
framed  in  the  doorway. 

"You  left  the  other  room  almost  dark,"  she  explained  a 
little  reproachfully  as  he  looked  up. 

"I  have  only  just  found  it,"  said  Kerr,  producing  a  little 
jar,  and  turning  to  her.  As  she  stood  there,  half  in  shadow, 
with  one  slim  hand  carefully  holding  the  white  bandage  in 
place  and  her  kimono  hanging  in  loose  folds  about  her, 
she  might  have  been  the  model  for  a  mediaeval  martyr. 

"Now,  if  you  please,"  he  continued  in  businesslike  tones, 
beginning  to  tear  up  a  handkerchief. 

She  slipped  the  knotted  band  over  her  head  and  cautiously 
attempted  to  take  away  the  little  wetted  pad  he  had  placed 
underneath.  But  the  blood  had  clotted,  and  the  pad  was 
now  securely  stuck.  She  gave  a  little  whimper  of  dismay. 

"Come  to  this  basin,"  he  said  authoritatively,  "and  we  will 
easily  get  it  off  with  the  aid  of  a  sponge." 

But  the  operation  necessitated  his  coming  so  close  to  her 
that  his  hands  suddenly  became  clumsy.  The  warmth  and 
faint  scent  of  her  person  added  to  his  emotion,  and  it  is  to 
be  feared  that  he  took  a  wholly  unnecessary  time  to  do 
what  should  have  been  done  in  a  moment. 

The  pallor  had  fled  from  her  cheeks  by  the  time  he  had 
finished,  and  something  in  his  manner  made  her  only  look 
at  him  furtively. 

"That  will  do,  I  think,"  she  said  a  little  abruptly,  the 
very  moment  he  had  the  new  bandage  in  place.  "Thank 
you  very  much." 

She  moved  off  without  looking  at  him  again;  and  the  last 
he  saw  of  her  was  her  retreating  form  slowly  going  along 
the  verandah,  her  way  lighted  by  the  lamp  he  held  aloft. 


CHAPTER  VI 

"II  faut  rire  avant  que  d'etre  heureux  de  petit 
de  mourir  sans  avoir  ri." — LA  BRUYfeRE. 

MEANWHILE,  in  England,  so  far  off  from  the  scenes  which 
have  just  been  chronicled,  life  marched  seriously  and 
sedately,  in  growing  ignorance  of  the  portentous  stew  being 
slowly  prepared  in  the  vast  cauldron  of  the  Orient.  Not 
even  the  rough  outlines  of  the  problem  were  now  grasped: 
China  had  relapsed  into  being  merely  a  distant  country 
full  of  yellow  men,  eternally  squabbling,  and  thereby  inviting 
disaster.  It  is  undoubtedly  difficult  to  get  and  keep  the 
right  angle  of  view  at  such  a  long  range ;  and  so,  after  pro- 
viding food  for  thought  and  discussion  during  several  whole 
weeks,  it  was  only  natural  that  such  distressful  politics,  with 
their  kaleidoscopic  changes,  should  be  relegated  to  a  very 
subordinate  place.  China  having  been  forced  to  agree,  in 
the  final  form  of  treaties,  to  the  various  demands  of  the. 
Powers,  and  a  definite  epoch  having  been  thus  brought  to  a 
close,  it  was  undoubtedly  too  much  to  expect  continued 
attention  on  the  part  of  people  only  distantly  concerned  with 
such  an  obscure  region. 

Even  to  those  in  England  who  had  a  financial  stake,  the 
anti-climax  brought  about  by  China's  complete  collapse 
over  the  question  of  the  territorial  leases  was  disheartening, 
and  all  began  shrugging  their  shoulders  in  open  disgust. 
Alone  Sir  James  Barker  remained  as  keen  as  ever.  He  at 
least  understood  that  the  financial  possibilities  remained  just 
as  great,  no  matter  what  the  political  outlook  might  be. 
Apprised  by  cable  of  what  was  being  done  in  a  dozen  dif- 
ferent directions,  he  soon  guessed  that  Peter  Kerr  was  meet- 
ing more  than  his  match.  Yet  even  he,  who  understood  so 
much,  little  suspected  that  Peter  Kerr  was  rather  like  a 


126  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

fly  exploring  a  spider's  web,  and  therefore  destined  to  meet 
the  fly's  historic  fate — unless  he  drew  back  in  time. 

The  big  banker,  however,  no  matter  what  he  might  pri- 
vately think,  was  always  careful,  when  he  communicated 
the  news  from  China  to  his  associates,  to  give  only  bald 
facts  without  any  of  the  enlightening  explanations  he  was 
really  capable  of  making.  He  had  good  reason  for  his 
reserved  attitude.  For  at  one  and  the  same  time  that  he 
was  doing  everything  in  his  power  to  forward  this  particular 
scheme  of  Peter  Kerr's,  he  was  not  omitting  to  take  other 
steps  to  protect  his  interests  by  certain  methods  familiar  to 
the  world  of  higher  finance — a  world,  be  it  remarked,  in 
which  the  vital  question  of  pounds  sterling  mightily  over- 
shadows everything  else. 

To  state  things  plainly,  Barker  was  securing  that  he 
would  be  able  to  participate  in  all  China  railway  conces- 
sions which  might  be  placed  on  the  European  markets,  no 
matter  by  whom  they  might  be  fathered  or  by  whom 
negotiated;  and  by  this  step  he  was  virtually  securing 
himself  against  any  direct  loss.  His  financial  position  being 
far  superior  to  that  of  his  rivals  of  the  Oriental  Corporation, 
who  were  attempting  a  piecemeal  scheme  of  their  own  in 
China,  he  was  able  to  learn  privately  exactly  what  they  were 
doing,  and  how  they  were  now  striving  hard  to  convince  the 
authorities  that  support  should  be  given  them  unconditionally 
in  view  of  the  fact  that  they  were  the  proper  guardians  of 
English  interests  in  that  particular  field.  In  this,  Barker 
admitted,  there  was  nothing  very  novel,  since  in  finance,  as 
in  politics,  spheres  of  influence  have  long  been  accepted  as 
a  very  natural  modern  development.  Still,  there  were  cer- 
tain special  circumstances  in  this  particular  instance  which 
he  could  not  forget,  and  which  made  him  feel  that  he  was 
morally  justified  in  doing  anything  he  deemed  advisable  to 
secure  his  own  success. 

Sir  James  Barker  received  almost  daily  reports  of  all  these 
intrigues  and  manoeuvres;  and  whenever  he  met  his  London 
rivals  he  smiled  grimly  to  himself.  He  had  many  surprises 


THE  HUMAN  COBWEB  127 

in  his  pockets,  he  thought,  and  he  would  take  them  out 
slowly  one  by  one.  Whilst  he  frankly  confessed  that  the 
shifting  politics  and  the  Machiavellian  intrigues  of  the  Far 
East  were  beyond  him,  he  was  equally  firm  in  his  convic- 
tion that  the  money  market  could  not  jump  away  from  under 
his  feet;  and  therefore,  as  he  was  in  a  commanding  posi- 
tion at  the  commanding  part  of  the  world — which  is  the 
centre,  or  the  hub — he  had  the  strong  man's  belief  that 
fortune  could  hardly  be  unkind  to  him. 

Yet  at  the  same  time  that  this  was  so  he  knew  what  very  few 
other  men  in  London  knew:  and  this  was  what  seriously 
disconcerted  him.  Briefly,  he  possessed  certain  information 
which  would  possibly  have  thrown  his  English  rivals  into  his 
arms  had  they  suspected  its  nature.  It  was  familiar  to  every 
one,  of  course,  that  large  continental  interests  were  working 
strenuously  in  China  to  gain  concessions  of  every  kind;  but 
few  suspected  that  no  less  than  four  European  governments 
were  now  virtually  joining  forces,  thanks  to  a  secret 
understanding  arranged  in  Brussels,  and  were  actually  spend- 
ing money  with  the  greatest  possible  freedom  in  China  so  as 
to  secure  their  own  ends.  Sir  James  Barker  had  received  a 
categorical  account  of  the  vast  plans  which  centred  round 
the  Belgian  monarch,  who  saw  in  Chinese  railways  not  only 
a  handsome  investment  but  a  means  towards  acquiring 
political  power  which  might  materially  influence  world- 
politics.  The  confidential  agent  who  had  furnished  Sir 
James  Barker  with  the  report  in  which  he  laid  bare  these 
far-reaching  ideas  had  concluded  his  detailed  statement  by 
affirming  that  picked  men  who  had  been  exploiting  the 
immense  Congo  domains  in  the  interest  of  their  royal  master 
were  soon  to  be  placed  in  charge  of  the  China  railway  cam- 
paign. At  a  private  conference  already  held,  it  had  been 
dramatically  announced  to  the  bankers  there  assembled  that 
"the  king,  our  master,  states  that  whoever  controls  the 
railways  of  China  will  control  the  future  of  that  country. 
He  therefore  solicits  your  sincere  co-operation  and  prompt 
action."  It  was  not  yet  certain  how  far  these  curious 


128  THE   HUMAN    COBWEB 

intrigues  had  actually  gone ;  but  there  was  reason  to  suspect 
that  in  a  very  few  months  it  would  be  too  late  to  combat 
them.  In  other  words,  unless  something  unforeseen  hap- 
pened, the  entire  China  field  would  be  surrendered  to  the 
exploitation  of  continental  financiers,  and  not  a  single 
important  line  of  railway  could  be  secured  by  others. 

Barker  in  these  circumstances  had  long  hesitated  regarding 
what  he  should  do.  He  seriously  wondered  for  a  long  time 
whether  it  would  not  be  really  safer  to  join  forces  with  his 
London  rivals  before  it  was  too  late.  Should  he  himself 
make  the  first  overtures?  In  the  end,  however,  he  dissuaded 
himself  from  acting  on  this  idea,  because  he  knew  that  to  do 
so  would  be  to  bind  himself  hand  and  foot  and  to  lose 
completely  that  liberty  of  action — that  independence — which 
he  always  so  highly  esteemed.  For  in  return  for  the  support 
which  the  British  government  undoubtedly  would  give  to 
a  combined  London  group,  explicit  obedience  to  official  sug- 
gestions would  be  demanded,  and  thereby  all  possibility  of 
large  and  daring  plans  being  consummated  would  be 
destroyed.  For,  considering  the  manner  in  which  the  Port 
Arthur  incident  had  been  handled,  it  was  certain  that  the 
British  government  would  not  risk  offending  political  rivals 
by  demanding  any  really  comprehensive  railway  concession 
in  China. 

Sir  James  Barker  was  one  of  a  few  men  who  believed  that 
private  enterprise  was  being  already  much  too  much  ham- 
pered by  paternal  methods,  which  tended  to  destroy  all 
boldness  in  private  initiative  and  thus  to  yield  the  field  to 
more  enterprising  rivals.  He  thus  had  no  wish  to  secure 
government  support.  At  the  close  of  the  nineteenth  century, 
in  his  opinion,  it  should  be  no  more  necessary  for  the  govern- 
ment to  stage-manage  concessions  in  Asia  than,  for  instance, 
in  South  America  or  South  Africa,  where,  if  such  a  thing 
were  attempted,  there  would  be  an  instant  outcry  among  the 
great  finance  houses,  who  had  always  relied  entirely  on  their 
own  endeavours  and  who  did  not  indeed  understand  such 
pettifogging  politics.  In  a  word,  Barker,  not  being  saturated 


THE   HUMAN  COBWEB  129 

with  India  and  China  traditions — in  fact,  knowing  practi- 
cally nothing  about  them — did  not  understand  why  there 
should  be  such  constant  solicitude  about  government  sup- 
port. Every  one  talked  to  him  about  it  as  if  it  were  a  sine 
qua  non.  Yet  it  seemed  to  him  quite  wrong  that  such  sub- 
servience should  exist,  since  governments,  from  their  very 
nature,  cannot  have  the  courage  of  private  enterprise  and 
undoubtedly  seek,  above  all  things,  to  avoid  trouble  and 
international  difficulties.  The  more  Sir  James  Barker 
thought  over  the  matter  the  more  perplexed  did  he  become; 
it  seemed  to  him  the  most  involved  problem  he  had  ever 
been  called  upon  to  handle. 

One  Sunday  afternoon,  full  of  such  ideas,  and  having 
nothing  to  do,  he  did  a  rather  strange  thing — he  decided  to 
call  on  Phyllis  May.  He  knew  that  he  would  find  the 
Mays  at  home  if  he  went  sufficiently  early;  and  on  arriving 
at  their  house  he  was  greatly  relieved  to  find  his  surmise 
correct.  Phyllis  May  was  already  in  the  drawing-room, 
waiting  for  him,  when  he  entered  the  room,  and  going  up  to 
her  quickly  he  expressed  his  pleasure  at  catching  her  in. 

"How  good  of  you  to  come,"  she  said  in  her  fresh,  frank 
voice  as  she  shook  hands.  "I  was  doing  what  somebody 
says  a  gentleman  never  does — I  was  looking  out  of  the 
window  when  I  saw  you  drive  up.  Otherwise  you  might 
have  missed  me,  for  I  was  about  to  go  out,  and  was  looking 
to  see  if  the  carriage  had  come.  But  I  really  haven't  got 
anything  special  to  do,  so  don't  think  you  are  keeping  me  in." 

She  laughed  a  little  after  this  rather  involved  speech  and 
sat  down,  wondering  why  he  had  called.  She  was  quite  sure, 
as  she  studied  Sir  James  Barker's  grave  face,  that  he  had  some 
special  object,  and  somehow  she  felt  equally  sure  that  the 
object  must  be  in  some  way  connected  with  Peter  Kerr. 

"We  have  not  seen  each  other  for  such  a  very  long  time 
that  I  feel  I  should  begin  by  apologizing,"  remarked  Sir 
James  Barker  courteously,  purposely  leading  the  conversa- 
tion aside  for  a  moment  to  give  himself  time  to  think  what 
he  should  say. 


130  THE   HUMAN  COBWEB 

Phyllis  murmured  something  vague  in  reply.  She  wondered 
now  whether  she  had  been  mistaken  in  her  first  idea. 

"Let  me  see,"  went  on  Sir  James  Barker  ponderously,  "I 
think  I  have  seen  you  only  twice  since  our  friend  Kerr  gave 
us  the  slip.  Yes — just  twice.  How  time  flies !" 

He  paused,  as  if  that  trite  remark  required  some  digesting, 
though  he  was  really  secretly  wondering  whether  Phyllis 
was  going  to  leave  everything  to  him. 

Well,  she  was.  Since  it  was  about  Peter  Kerr  after  all, 
it  was  Sir  James  Barker's  business  to  do  the  talking;  and 
this  her  manner  most  clearly  showed. 

"Time  certainly  does  fly,"  she  remarked,  agreeing  with  his 
last  reflection  cheerfully  and  ignoring  the  rest.  "And  yet, 
since  that  is  really  the  case,  why  should  we  often  feel  so 
savagely  about  Time  that  we  must  think  up  means  to  kill  it  ? 
It  is  illogical,  is  it  not?  The  poor  thing  is  running  away  as 
fast  as  it  can,  and  still  that  is  not  enough  for  us.  We  express 
the  wicked  wish  to  catch  up  and  kill  it — at  regular  intervals!" 

Sir  James  Barker  laughed  at  this  speech.  The  idea  she 
suggested  was  certainly  quaint;  Phyllis  always  said  some- 
thing novel,  he  had  remarked  to  himself  before. 

"All  the  same,  I  don't  think  it's  really  illogical,"  he  replied, 
arguing  for  the  sake  of  gaining  time  and  thus  seeing  whether 
she  had  purposely  chosen  such  a  neutral  subject.  "It  is  our 
blind  egotism  which  makes  us  inevitably  take  the  purely 
subjective  point  of  view — the  one  derived  from  our  own  con- 
sciousness— when  the  only  proper  point  of  view  from  which 
properly  to  regard  such  a  matter  as  time  is  the  objective — 
that  is,  the  external,  the  actual  point  of  view,  quite  apart 
from  the  sensations  and  the  emotions." 

Phyllis  put  her  hands  to  her  ears  in  mock  terror,  though 
she  was  secretly  relieved  at  the  turn  the  conversation  had 
taken. 

"You  are  talking  above  my  head,"  she  said.  "I  am  not 
wise  enough  to  understand  anything  save  purely  from  the 
point  of  view  of  the  sensations  and  the  emotions.  What 
you  maintain  may  be  philosophical,  but  it  is  hardly  human. 


THE  HUMAN  COBWEB  131 

For  how  can  one  judge  of  a  matter  which  affects  life  so 

intimately  as  time  does  if  one  excludes  those  essentials  from 

consideration?" 

Sir  James  Barker  laughed  good-humouredly  and  refused 

to  go. 

"If  I  have  been  talking  above  your  head,"  he  said,  with 
an  attempt  at  jocularity,  "then  you  are  talking  beyond  my 
reach.  Which  is  the  worst?  I  ought  to  have  known  that 
it  would  be  useless,"  he  concluded.  "What  a  man  you 
would  have  made!" 

He  looked  at  her  with  more  admiration  than  he  generally 
bestowed  on  the  opposite  sex. 

"I  make  a  man !"  returned  Phyllis  as  if  she  were  protesting, 
though  she  was  secretly  flattered.  "Never — I  might  have 
made  a  lawyer,  but  never  a  real  man." 

"What  is  the  difference?"  inquired  Sir  James  Barker, 
looking  amused  once  more. 

"The  difference,"  replied  Phyllis,  "is  immense.  All  women 
are  lawyers  by  instinct — they  can  split  hairs  but  they  cannot 
split  heads.  That  is  one  point — I  have  dozens  of  others 
hidden  away  somewhere.  And  you  will  remember  that  there 
is  the  historic  case  of  Portia  to  quote.  What  more  do  you 
want?" 

It  was  Sir  James  Barker's  turn  to  put  up  his  hands. 

"You  have  grown  up  so  rapidly  during  the  past  couple  of 
years,"  he  said  genially,  "that  I  have  not  been  able  to  follow 
your  progress.  You  have  left  me  miles  behind:  I  can  no 
longer  argue  with  you.  Why  have  you  done  it  so  suddenly?" 

Phyllis  shrugged  her  shoulders  and  gave  a  sigh. 

"Alas!"  she  said.  "The  result  is  not  so  very  astonishing 
when  you  come  to  think  of  it — excepting  to  mothers.  One 
has  to  grow  up,  I  suppose,  and  there  is  no  reason  why  some 
should  not  do  it  rather  hastily  and  some  rather  slowly." 

Suddenly  she  looked  at  the  banker  with  an  amused  expres- 
sion, and  determined  to  carry  the  war  into  the  enemy's 
camp. 

"I  don't  believe,  Sir  James,"  she  continued,  "that  you  were 


i32  THE  HUMAN  COBWEB 

ever  much  of  a  boy  yourself;  so  why  should  you  be  so 
astonished  at  me?  At  sixteen  you  most  certainly  were  a 
full-fledged  banker  investing  every  one's  savings  in  three-  or 
four-per-cents  and  shaking  your  head  dismally  at  the  crop 
outlook  when  you  should  have  been  playing  football.  Is 
that  a  picture  true  or  not?" 

Sir  James  Barker  laughed  indulgently.  As  he  did  so,  he 
made  up  his  mind  that  he  would  have  to  broach  the  subject 
he  had  in  mind  with  absolute  directness.  So,  since  that  was 
the  case,  he  began  by  looking  at  his  watch. 

"Why,  it  is  half-past  four  already,"  he  exclaimed.  "I  hope 
I  am  not  keeping  you.  I  must  be  going.  We  have  been 
talking  for  ever  so  many  minutes  about  nothing." 

He  paused  with  his  watch  out  as  if  he  could  not  believe  it, 
and  then  made  as  if  he  were  going  to  get  up.  On  the 
mantelpiece  a  solemn  gong-beat  gave  confirmation  to  the 
hour. 

Phyllis  put  out  a  hand  as  if  to  detain  him.  She  had 
suddenly  become  not  so  certain  that  there  had  been  any 
particular  object. 

"It  is  half-past  four,"  she  said  a  little  unnecessarily,  "but 
I  am  really  not  in  any  hurry.  Do  you  hear  anything  from 
China?"  Well — there,  at  last  she  had  done  it. 

"How  curious!"  exclaimed  Sir  James  Barker  in  answer  to 
her  question,  suddenly  looking  immensely  relieved.  "That's 
just  what  I  was  going  to  ask  you." 

Phyllis  smiled  faintly. 

"Great  minds "  she  began,  scanning  his  features. 

"Of  course  I  hear  all  the  time  from  Kerr  by  telegraph," 
said  Barker,  "but  somehow  I  am  not  quite  satisfied  that 
all  is  going  well,  or  going  to  go  well.  I  cannot  exactly  tell 
you  why  it  is,  but  that  is  what  I  feel.  You  know  how  these 
things  come  about,  though  no  one  can  explain  them.  There 
has  not  been  time  to  hear  by  mail,  but  somehow  I  read  in 
his  telegrams  that  Kerr  doesn't  seem  to  have  the  go,  the 
push,  the  confidence,  I  expected.  Frankly,  I  am  feeling 
disappointed." 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  133 

Sir  James  Barker  paused,  pulling  at  his  chin  in  a  charac- 
teristic action.  He  was  looking  into  the  distance  as  he 
spoke;  had  he  observed  Phyllis,  he  would  have  perhaps 
been  surprised  at  the  curious  medley  of  emotions  which 
passed  across  her  face.  But  he  was  full  of  his  own  thoughts ; 
for  his  words  had  brought  uppermost  to  his  mind  the 
anxiety  with  which  he  was  filled.  Suddenly  he  decided  to 
speak  frankly. 

"I  want  you,  Miss  May,"  he  said,  looking  at  her  squarely, 
"to  write  to  Kerr,  if  you  will,  and  to  write  to  him  in  the 
way  women  can  do  so  much  better  than  men.  In  a  far-off 
place  a  letter  is  a  good  tonic — especially  from  a  woman." 
He  paused,  and  then  went  on.  "Don't  feel  surprised  at 
me;  I  am  really  very  much  in  earnest.  I  remember  many 
years  ago  in  South  America  how  letters  helped  matters  con- 
siderably for  me.  You  know  the  saying,  'As  cold  waters  to 
a  thirsty  soul,  so  is  good  news  from  a  far  country/  It  is  a 
very  good  thing  for  a  man  to  have  letters." 

He  paused  yet  again,  feeling  that  he  had  been  clumsy,  and 
glanced  somewhat  embarrassedly  at  the  girl.  He  had  no 
definite  idea  how  she  felt  towards  Peter  Kerr,  and  he  was 
more  than  a  trifle  alarmed.  He  suddenly  remembered  that 
somebody  had  told  him  that  Kerr  had  not  fulfilled  certain 
expectations.  Had  he  made  a  serious  mistake? 

"I  hope  you  agree  with  me,"  he  said  anxiously.  "I  hope,  in 
fact,  there  is  no  reason  why  you  should  not  agree  with  me. 
If  there  is,  please  forget  that  I  ever  spoke." 

"There  is  no  reason  why  I  should  not  write,"  said  Phyllis 
in  a  reserved  manner  which  he  did  not  understand,  "and  if 
it  will  assist  you  in  any  way  I  will  most  certainly  do  so." 

Sir  James  Barker  thanked  her  profusely  once  again  when  he 
got  up  to  go.  He  was  a  little  puzzled  at  it  all,  he  con- 
fessed to  himself,  but  he  was  also  immensely  relieved.  At 
the  same  time  he  made  up  his  mind  to  make  some  inquiries — 
to  find  out  how  things  were.  Perhaps  he  should  have  con- 
sulted Mrs.  May.  He  had  never  quite  understood  Peter 
Kerr's  relations  with  Phyllis ;  nor  had  he  ever  found  a  valid 


134  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

reason  for  the  curious  estrangement  which  had  suddenly 
grown  up  between  her  and  Mrs.  John  West,  and  which  he 
had  distinctly  noticed  one  afternoon.  He  had  half  thought 
of  going  this  very  day  to  Mrs.  John  West  on  this  same 
errand;  now  for  some  reason  he  was  very  glad  he  had 
chosen  Phyllis. 

Phyllis  did  not  go  out  at  once,  as  she  had  first  proposed  to 
do  as  soon  as  her  visitor  had  left.  She  turned,  and  walking 
slowly  across  the  room,  once  more  gazed  through  the  win- 
dows. This  time,  however,  her  eyes  saw  nothing  of  the  busy 
world  outside;  they  were  roaming  far,  far  away — seeking 
to  understand  a  variety  of  things. 

Yes,  she  would  write.  Perhaps  she  should  have  written 
sooner.  Yet  she  did  not  exactly  want  to.  Why  should  she 
write?  Why  had  he  only  sent  her  the  briefest  line  on  the 
eve  of  his  departure — why  had  he  been  so  silent  since? 

A  hundred  questions  tumbled  over  one  another  in  her  mind 
and  found  no  answer.  It  was  not  until  night  had  come 
that  she  commenced  thinking  about  the  motives  which  had 
prompted  Sir  James  Barker  to  make  such  an  odd  request. 
Then  somehow  the  idea  took  root  that  the  banker  had  been 
purposely  non-committal,  so  as  not  to  show  that  it  was 
merely  a  strategic  move  on  his  part  to  assist  his  own  plans. 
That  made  Phyllis  angry — she  would  write  very  little. 

It  was  highly  fortunate  in  more  ways  than  one  that  Sir 
James  Barker  had  not  gone  that  day  in  search  of  consolation 
to  Mrs.  John  West.  For  Mrs.  John  West  was  far  away, 
sunning  herself  in  Ostend,  where  the  weather  is  always 
beautiful  and  it  is  pleasant  to  lounge  in  deep  basket-chairs 
under  red-striped  umbrellas  and  gaze  at  the  sea. 

"How  are  things  going  in  wonderful  China?"  she  inquired 
of  Colonel  Maes,  who  happened  to  be  there  too,  combining 
a  little  business  with  a  good  deal  of  pleasure. 

"Slowly,  very  slowly,"  he  confessed  without  embarrassment. 
"Our  various  rivals  are  much  more  formidable  than  we 
expected.  On  every  side  the  Chinese  are  being  tempted  with 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  135 

large  sums  of  money.  All  Europe  is  entering  the  race,  and 
some  of  our  people  are  a  little  nervous.  But  that  is  because 
they  do  not  know  the  personage  who  is  behind  us."  Colonel 
Maes  smiled  with  easy  satisfaction. 

"The  only  man  I  am  really  afraid  of  is  Peter  Kerr,"  said 
Mrs.  John  West  reflectively,  following  her  own  train  of 
thought.  "He  has  brains  and  money  and  will  certainly  stop 
at  nothing  if  he  sees  a  chance  of  success.  I  am  sure  of  that." 

"Really,"  replied  Colonel  Maes,  a  little  uneasily  now.  He 
felt  there  was  truth  in  what  she  said.  "What  makes  you 
still  afraid  of  him?" 

"I  am  anxious  about  my  money,  apart  from  anything  else," 
rejoined  Mrs.  John  West  vaguely.  "My  husband  will  be 
furious  if  I  lose  such  a  lot." 

"There  is  no  danger  of  that,  my  dear  madam,"  cried  the 
Belgian  quickly.  "We  have  guarantees  which  are  above 
suspicion."  He  remained  silent  a  minute,  busily  thinking. 
Then  he  went  on  in  a  changed  voice:  "May  I  ask  you 
frankly  if  you  can  think  of  any  way  of  arresting  your 
amiable  countryman's  activity?  What  sort  of  policy  should 
we  adopt  on  the  spot  to  foil  him — what  sort  of  man  is  he?" 

Mrs.  John  West  suddenly  laughed,  and  a  curious  expression 
came  into  her  eyes. 

"Whom  have  you  in  China?"  she  asked  with  simple  direct- 
ness. "Have  you  anybody  nice-looking,  for  instance?" 

Colonel  Maes  glanced  at  her  sharply,  and  then  suddenly 
clapped  his  hands  in  a  purely  continental  way. 

"It  takes  a  woman  to  suggest  things,"  he  exclaimed  in 
wicked  glee.  "We  shall  see  what  can  be  done."  He  picked 
up  his  stick  and  twirled  it  quickly  between  his  thin  hands, 
whilst  his  eyes  surveyed  the  gay  esplanade. 

"What  admirable  ideas  women  have!"  he  finished  a  little 
ambiguously  as  some  ladies  in  enormous  hats  slowly 
approached. 


CHAPTER  VII 

"II  n'y  a  au  monde  que  deux  manieres  de 
s'elever:  ou  par  sa  propre  Industrie,  ou  par 
1'imbecillite  des  autres." — LA  BRUY&RE. 

THE  morning  after  his  strange  midnight  adventure,  Peter 
Kerr  awoke  late.  For  a  few  moments  his  mind  remained 
a  blank.  Then,  as  he  jumped  up  to  make  certain  that  the 
strange  hour  which  his  watch  proclaimed  was  correct,  his 
eye  fell  on  the  disorder  which  he  had  left  untouched,  and  his 
heart  gave  a  sudden  leap.  In  the  sober  morning  light  the 
whole  thing  seemed  a  dream,  a  romance  of  the  brain.  Yet 
there  were  the  telltale  proofs  that  he  had  not  been  dreaming. 
He  gazed  around  him  in  increasing  wonderment  and  forgot 
all  about  the  hour. 

"Damn!"  he  swore  gently  to  himself.  The  curious  night- 
scene  now  rose  clearly  before  his  eyes  and  filled  Tiim  with 
conflicting  emotions.  And  as  neither  pondering  nor  gentle 
swearing  brought  any  relief  to  him,  suddenly  he  swung  to  his 
feet  and  rang  for  his  boy. 

A  loud  knock  on  the  door  came  so  quickly  that  he  was  sure 
it  was  not  his  servant. 

"Come  in,"  he  called,  rapidly  throwing  the  things  he  had 
picked  up  into  a  corner. 

As  the  door  opened,  he  swallowed  some  angry  words  and 
forced  his  features  into  an  unwilling  smile. 

He  might  have  known  it!  It  was  no  other  person  than 
Lorenzo,  arrayed  in  spotless  white  flannels  and  looking 
aggressively  cool  and  clean  and  collected.  The  straw  hat  on 
his  head  was  adorned  with  a  red  ribbon  carefully  chosen  to 
give  the  desired  effect — it  was  a  sort  of  crown  of  colour  on 
a  cloth  of  innocence — whilst  his  necktie  was  a  clever  blend 
between  the  two  extremes.  As  usual,  Lorenzo  was  smoking 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  137 

a  thick,  black  cigar,  which  he  held  with  studied  grace.  To 
Kerr,  just  at  that  moment,  there  was  something  infinitely 
jarring  in  the  man,  because  he  was  manifestly  so  sure  of 
himself. 

"Good-morning,"  said  the  Italian  very  deliberately,  pausing 
on  the  threshold.  "I  hope  I  have  not  disturbed  you." 

He  spoke  politely  enough,  but  there  was  a  peculiar  sardonic 
expression  about  his  lips  and  eyes  which  said  those  things 
which  he  was  good  enough  to  leave  unspoken.  It  was  as  if 
he  were  infinitely  amused  at  having  such  a  complete  advan- 
tage over  the  man  of  whom  he  wished  to  ask  a  favour. 
Perhaps  his  fresh  morning  attire  added  to  this  impression ; 
but  no  matter  what  it  was,  it  was  borne  in  on  Kerr  with 
distressing  distinctness  that  his  visitor  had  him  at  a  distinct 
disadvantage. 

"I  hope  I  am  not  disturbing  you,"  repeated  Lorenzo,  still 
standing  on  the  door-sill  and  watching  the  other  with  an 
absolute  assurance  of  manner.  He  knew  that  the  Eng- 
lishman would  with  pleasure  have  slammed  the  door  in  his 
face;  but  he  also  knew  that  one  cannot  very  well  do  this 
to  a  person  who  is  studiously  polite,  no  matter  how  much  one 
may  wish  to. 

"Not  at  all,"  answered  Peter  Kerr  after  a  pause,  speaking 
rather  roughly  in  spite  of  himself;  "as  you  see,  I  was  just 
going  to  take  a  bath.  I  was  merely  wondering  whether 
I  should  postpone  that  happy  event  or  ask  you  to  wait  until 
it  was  over.  It  was  a  question  of  two  alternatives."  He 
had  it  on  the  tip  of  his  tongue  to  say  "the  lesser  of  two  evils." 

"I  will  not  keep  you  long,"  replied  the  Italian,  settling  the 
question  at  once  by  advancing  with  the  same  deliberation 
into  the  room  and  closing  the  door  carefully  behind  him. 
"Time  flies,"  he  continued,  going  to  the  sitting-room  and 
drawing  Kerr  after  him.  "Time  flies,  my  friend,  and  just 
now  in  this  country  there  is  no  time  to  waste.  Look  at  what 
happened  here  as  recently  as  yesterday." 

He  flicked  a  paper  he  drew  from  his  pocket  carelessly 
across  to  Kerr,  who  had  unwillingly  seated  himself  at  a 


138  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

small  table  in  the  centre  of  the  room.  Peter  Kerr  rapidly 
read  through  its  typewritten  contents. 

"What!"  he  exclaimed  as  soon  as  he  had  reached  the  end, 
"a  sixteen-million  loan  signed  yesterday?"  He  began  to 
realize  anew  that  he  knew  nothing  of  what  was  going  on 
in  this  mysterious  capital. 

Lorenzo  shrugged  his  shoulders. 

"Yes,"  he  replied  carelessly,  "we  all  expected  it.  It  had  to 
come.  It  is  the  last  payment  China  had  to  make  as  the 
result  of  one  of  the  little  follies  she  has  so  consistently  com- 
mitted. This  is  the  final  part  of  the  indemnity  of  the  Jap- 
anese war  of  a  few  years  ago.  We  all  expected  it." 

He  looked  thoughtfully  into  space,  allowing  sufficient  time 
to  pass  for  Kerr  properly  to  assimilate  the  news  he  had 
brought  him. 

"But,"  he  continued,  "it  was,  all  the  same,  rather  neatly 
done.  Not  a  soul  knew  about  it  until  this  morning,  when  it 
was  too  late  for  the  usual  diplomatic  protests  and  threats." 
He  laughed  contemptuously  and  then  went  on:  "Now  if 
sixteen  millions  can  be  arranged  for  so  easily,  why  not  a 
larger  sum  for  a  purpose  which  is  China's  own  benefit — 
railways?  The  only  thing  is — secrecy.  If  things  leak  out, 
there  would  be  an  end  to  everything  at  once." 

"Why?"  asked  Peter  Kerr.  He  was  already  interested,  in 
spite  of  his  disinclination  to  begin  business  at  such  an  early 
hour.  The  Italian  was  one  of  those  who,  strangely  enough, 
become  interesting  the  moment  they  speak. 

"Do  you  need  to  ask  why?"  he  inquired.  "It  is  because 
suspicion  is  in  the  air;  because  we  are  all  very  greedy  and 
want  to  make  money  very  badly;  because  we  are  all  anxious 
to  steal  a  march  on  our  competitors  and  to  be  proclaimed 
great  and  clever.  All  this  is  in  the  air  in  Peking;  it  is 
mixed  up  with  the  dirty  dust  and  the  bad  smells.  It  is  the 
principal  thought  from  morning  to  night;  and,  finally,  it  is 
the  exact  reason  why  I  have  been  up  and  dressed  these  two 
hours  waiting  to  see  you." 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  139 

He  concluded  this  remarkable  speech  with  an  emphatic 
gesture,  after  which  he  put  out  his  hand  to  take  back  his 
paper.  The  cynical  indifference  in  his  face  had  given  place 
to  an  energy  of  expression  which  was  surprising.  Lorenzo 
at  work,  planning  and  building  with  deft  hand  and  subtle 
insinuations,  was  a  different  man  from  Lorenzo  the 
dilettante  in  wines  and  effeminate  toilets ;  if  he  was  like  this 
in  mere  descriptive  work,  what  must  he  not  be  when  he 
was  hot  on  his  own  schemes,  fighting  the  fight  against  cun- 
ning rivals?  It  was  a  question  well  worth  asking — and 
quickly  deciding,  thought  Kerr. 

So  he  threw  the  cigarette  he  had  been  smoking  far  out  over 
the  verandah,  and  brought  his  strong  hands  together  with  a 
sudden  cracking  of  his  finger-joints. 

"Well,"  he  said  shortly,  "I  accept  your  offer  of  last  night. 
I  believe  we  had  better  lose  no  time.  Propose  your  own 
terms." 

Lorenzo  made  no  immediate  answer.  He  took  off  his  hat 
in  a  leisurely  manner  and  wiped  his  forehead  with  a  silk 
handkerchief  in  a  characteristically  easy  and  graceful  gesture. 
He  was  very  calm.  Then  he  smiled  with  that  Latin  smile 
which  lights  up  the  whole  face  and  can  mean  everything — 
or  nothing. 

"The  devil!"  he  said.  "It  makes  one  hot  to  talk  even  at 
ten  in  the  morning.  Summer  will  soon  be  here  and  then  we 
shall  bake." 

He  carefully  replaced  his  hat — this  time  in  a  somewhat 
debonair  manner  on  the  back  of  his  head — and  taking  out 
a  gold  pencil-case,  he  adjusted  it  and  began  rapidly  making 
calculations.  He  pondered  frequently  as  he  wrote  figures 
and  scratched  them  out,  beginning  each  time  more  carefully. 
Finally  he  seemed  to  make  up  his  mind,  for,  tearing  a  fresh 
sheet  from  the  heavy  note-book  in  which  he  was  writing,  he 
ruled  it  off  roughly  and  filled  in  a  number  of  calculations. 
The  completed  copy  brought  a  smile  of  approbation  to  his 
face. 

"That  is  about  right,  I  think,"  he  said  with  careful  delibera- 


140  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

tion  as  he  passed  it  over  to  Peter  Kerr.  "You  must  let  me 
have  two  thousand  pounds  at  once." 

Kerr  rapidly  ran  through  the  totals  and  the  staccato 
explanatory  notes.  They  dealt  in  plain  language  with  the 
manner  in  which  these  moneys  would  be  expended  at  once. 
The  manner  was  eminently  practical  and  suited  to  the 
peculiar  circumstances  which  had  to  be  met. 

Having  already  made  up  his  mind,  without  a  word  Kerr 
got  up  and  fetched  a  despatch-box.  He  filled  in  a  cheque 
for  the  amount  stipulated  and  handed  it  promptly  over  to 
Lorenzo.  The  Italian  read  it  carefully,  nodded  his  head, 
folded  up  the  bit  of  paper  with  singular  method  and  placed 
it  in  a  pocketbook.  Then  he  took  his  own  little  memorandum 
of  expenses  and  wrote  across  the  back  of  the  paper  in  a  flow- 
ing hand  a  full  receipt  for  the  sum. 

"Now  that  we  have  got  so  far,"  he  said,  "let  us  get  a 
little  farther.  I  want  all  possible  details  and  some  sheets 
of  foolscap.  You  must  remember  that  I  must  have  a 
rough  general  idea  about  your  business.  We  can  finish  every- 
thing necessary  this  morning." 

Whilst  Kerr  opened  rolls  of  papers  and  plans,  the  Italiaa 
himself  prepared  for  work.  He  took  off  his  coat  and  drew 
from  a  pocket  a  large-scale  map  of  China,  which  he 
unfolded  and  pinned  to  the  table.  Then,  with  the  sheets  of 
foolscap  beside  him,  he  began  noting  rapidly  what  was  read 
to  him.  Soon  the  two  men  were  so  absorbed  in  their  work 
that  they  lost  all  count  of  the  time. 

"I  think  I  have  got  everything  I  want  for  the  present.  It 
is  a  question  at  the  commencement  of  placing  yourself 
entirely  in  my  hands.  You  will  get  good  treatment." 

The  Italian  made  the  statement  in  his  same  deliberate  man- 
ner, as  he  first  gathered  his  foolscap  together  and  then  fixed 
his  eyes  with  some  satisfaction  on  the  map.  Marked  out  in 
thick  strokes  was  the  whole  network  of  lines  proposed  by 
Kerr,  a  network  which  seemed  to  change  the  whole  aspect 
of  the  country.  "It  will  be  the  devil  of  a  job,"  he  con- 


THE  HUMAN   COBWEB  141 

tinued,  "but  by  aspiring  to  so  much  something  must  come 
of  it.     I  begin  to  understand." 

He  leaned  back,  and  extending  his  arms  high  above  his 
head  yawned  ungracefully.  Then  he  took  out  his  watch. 

"We  have  put  in  nearly  two  hours,"  he  said,  "and  I  have 
enough  to  go  on  with  for  a  couple  of  weeks.  You  had  better 
push  on  with  the  detailed  plans  so  that  when  necessary  we 
can  file  them.  How  long  will  it  be  before  the  first  surveys 
are  finished  ?" 

"By  hurrying,  some  may  be  finished  in  a  month — some  in 
two  months.  I  shall  telegraph  this  afternoon." 

"Good,"  replied  the  Italian,  thoughtfully  tapping  with  his 
gold  pencil  on  his  scrawled  notes.  "We  will  be  able  to  feed 
the  Chinamen  here  in  regular  doses.  That  is  the  way  to 
work  with  them — to  excite  their  curiosity  as  well  as  their 
cupidity — and  then  to  keep  on  feeding  them  with  new  de- 
tails all  the  time." 

He  got  up  and  reached  for  his  coat. 

"By  the  bye,"  he  said  with  assumed  carelessness,  "I  brought 
some  documents  to  show  you  in  case  you  needed  persuading." 

He  took  his  heavy  pocketbook  once  more  and  drew  out 
some  papers.  Without  unfolding  them,  he  handed  them 
across  to  Peter  Kerr. 

"Oh-ho !"  said  Kerr  as  he  glanced  at  the  signatures.  "These 
are  big  people,  even  for  London." 

"Yes,"  said  the  Italian  with  sudden  simplicity,  "yes,  but 
I  am  not  their  representative,  you  will  notice  if  you  read. 
I  am  only  'recommended'  by  them,  a  little  in  the  same  way 
that  a  coachman  or  a  valet  is  recommended  to  strangers. 
This  is  because,  though  they  are  quite  willing  to  profit  by 
my  success,  they  are  unwilling  to  be  identified  with  a  mere 
concession-hunter  until  it  pays  them  in  spot  cash  to  be  so. 
Is  it  not  a  pretty  world?" 

The  Italian's  manner  had  changed  again,  and  now  he  spoke 
with  supreme  and  biting  sarcasm.  He  seemed  to  resent 
the  wording  of  these  letters  with  the  acute  resentment  of 
the  man  who  knows  that  his  brains  and  energy  are  held 


i42  THE  HUMAN   COBWEB 

in  far  higher  esteem  than  his  person — and  who  is  convinced 
that  this  is  both  cowardly  and  unjust.  For  a  moment  this 
righteous  indignation  filled  him  to  the  exclusion  of  every- 
thing else:  then,  his  mood  having  quickly  spent  itself,  he 
suddenly  shrugged  his  shoulders. 

"Never  mind,"  he  said  with  a  careless  laugh,  as  with  an 
air  of  finality  he  restored  the  papers  to  his  inner  pocket.  "It 
is  the  successful  man  who  counts  to-day,  and  shortly  I 
shall  be  successful — completely  successful.  To  succeed  in 
China  one  must  possess  one's  self  of  a  little  piece  of  paper — 
that  is,  an  Imperial  Edict,  and  nothing  more.  Sometimes  it 
contains  only  a  few  dozen  words  and  no  more;  sometimes 
scarcely  a  dozen.  That  little  piece  of  paper  has  to  be  pur- 
sued night  and  day  until  it  flutters  and  falls  within  one's 
grasp.  For  how  potent  it  is!  It  is  a  veritable  talisman — it 
accomplishes  everything.  On  top  of  it  one  can 'build  the 
most  extravagant  schemes — nothing  is  impossible  in  China 
when  the  Emperor  himself  has  spoken.  That  is  why  I  am 
smiled  on  by  grave  financiers  who  are  willing  to  be  my  archi- 
tects once  the  foundations  have  been  securely  laid." 

Lorenzo  breathed  deeply  and  leaned  his  elbows  on  the 
table.  Then  he  looked  satirically  at  Kerr. 

"Perhaps  you  understand  now  why  you  found  it  impossi- 
ble to  make  a  start.  Possibly  you  expected  to  find  govern- 
ment offices  here  where  public  business  is  transacted  much 
as  in  England.  I  cannot  imagine  what  you  expected.  Per- 
haps you  thought  of  the  Legations.  Well,  they  are  very  busy 
eating  and  drinking  and  carrying  on  diplomacy.  The  real 
business  is  done  outside  by  men  who  accept  conditions  as 
they  find  them  and  care  for  nothing  but  success.  Do  you 
understand  me?  There  are  four  men  who  have  been  re- 
sponsible for  all  the  vast  schemes  and  counter-schemes  which 
are  beginning  to  upset  and  resettle  the  whole  Far  East. 
They  are " 

A  gust  of  rebellious  wind,  filled  with  choking  dust,  sud- 
denly swept  in  from  the  verandah  and  blew  round  the  room, 


THE   HUMAN  COBWEB  143 

banging  the  windows  to  and  bringing  papers  to  the  ground 
with  a  confusing  rustling.  With  a  rapid  movement  Lorenzo 
rescued  his  own  sheets  and  left  his  sentence  unfinished.  Peter 
Kerr,  having  picked  up  what  had  fallen  to  the  ground, 
looked  up  inquiringly  for  the  end.  But  the  Italian  was 
now  gazing  reflectively  out  of  the  window. 

"Well,"  said  Kerr  at  length,  "who  are  these  men?"  feeling 
that  he  had  now  the  right  to  inquire. 

The  Italian  laughed  piano,  pianissimo,  and  waved  an  arm 
towards  the  verandah. 

"I  have  changed  my  mind,"  ,he  said  quite  gravely.  "I  dare 
not  tell  you,  at  least  not  just  now.  Frankly,  I  am  super- 
stitious. That  wind  which  wished  to  scatter  our  papers 
was  an  omen,  a  warning.  It  was  what  is  still  printed  on 
the  shipping  documents  of  your  steamship  companies — 'the 
act  of  God  or  the  Queen's  enemies.'  We  must  be  careful." 

He  nodded  his  head  thoughtfully  and  became  silent.  Then 
he  took  his  cigar-case  from  his  pocket  and  offered  it  to  the 
Englishman.  Kerr,  who  was  disappointed,  shook  his  head, 
and  Lorenzo,  with  a  shrug  of  his  shoulders,  lighted  a  fresh 
cigar  himself. 

"I  am  sorry,"  he  said  carelessly,  "that  I  cannot  oblige  you 
as  I  was  going  to  do,  but,  as  I  told  you,  I  am  superstitious. 
If  I  told  you  now  the  names  of  the  four  men  it  would  do 
us  no  good.  You  must  trust  to  me — for  the  time  being  at 
least.  Later  we  shall  see." 

He  smiled  engagingly  and  folded  his  remaining  papers 
neatly  into  his  pockets.  Kerr  also  began  packing  up  his 
despatch-box  in  silence. 

"We  have  had  enough  business  for  this  morning,"  said 
Lorenzo,  watching  him  for  a  moment.  "I  think  I  will  go 
out;  it  is  a  beautiful  day,  though  warm." 

He  gazed  out  of  the  windows  in  the  same  indifferent  way, 
and  then  walked  in  his  leisurely  manner  on  to  the  verandah. 

"A  beautiful  day,"  he  resumed,  suddenly  breaking  off  with 
a  staccato  exclamation  in  Italian.  Kerr  shot  a  glance  at 


144  THE   HUMAN    COBWEB 

him — and  then  went  on  deliberately  packing  up  his  papers. 
Lorenzo  was  gazing  fixedly  down  the  verandah  in  the  direc- 
tion Peter  Kerr  had  gone  the  night  before. 

Lorenzo  stood  there  for  several  minutes  without  saying 
a  word,  apparently  absorbed  in  the  prospect,  and  then  sud- 
denly faced  round  and  came  back  into  the  room.  Peter 
Kerr,  had  he  looked  up,  would  have  found  that  his  mobile 
features  had  now  yet  another  expression.  There  was  a  curi- 
ous coarseness  on  his  face  hard  to  describe. 

"I  had  no  idea  you  had  such  an  appetizing  neighbour," 
he  began  tentatively. 

Peter  Kerr  looked  up  with  a  blankness  of  expression  which 
was  so  well  feigned  that  even  the  astute  Italian  was  de- 
ceived. Lorenzo  was  really  astonished. 

"What!"  he  exclaimed,  "you  have  not  taken  the  trouble  to 
notice  who  occupies  the  end  rooms  ?  It  is  Madame  Boisragon, 
the  wife  of  that  Frenchman  who  is  never  seen.  Yesterday 
I  told  you  about  them.  To-day  I  understand  why  he  hides 
her — especially  when  he  is  away." 

"Is  he  away?" 

The  question  fell  from  Peter  Kerr's  lips  involuntarily, 
and  almost  immediately  Lorenzo  broke  into  high-pitched 
laughter.  He  appeared  to  enjoy  the  joke,  for  he  did 
not  reply  at  once. 

"Excuse  me,"  he  said  at  length,  still  apparently  struggling 
with  his  feelings,  "but  I  am  easily  amused  with  certain  things. 
That  remark  of  yours  was  characteristic:  English  caution 
must  always  be  satisfied  before  English  interest  can  be 
aroused!  It  is  beautiful.  I  have  often  thought  that  the 
real  English  Romeo  would  secure  that  Juliet's  father  and 
mother  were  out  at  a  dinner-party  and  the  nurse  drunk  in 
the  kitchen  before  venturing  under  any  window — let  alone 
going  farther !  Is  that  not  true?" 

To  the  Italian's  surprise,  instead  of  being  offended  at  this 
caustic  description  of  British  limitations,  Peter  Kerr  laughed 
so  heartily  that  Lorenzo,  with  his  quick  mind  always  on 
the  alert  for  surprises  and  mysteries,  suddenly  looked  at  him 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  145 

suspiciously.  The  Englishman  laughed  too  long,  it  seemed 
to  him;  only  very  foolish  people  laughed  like  that — without 
any  special  reason.  Now  this  man  was  no  fool 

"Perhaps  I  have  been  indiscreet,"  Lorenzo  began  in  his 
old  sardonic  tones,  buttoning  his  coat  and  fixing  his  hat 
on  his  head  with  the  peculiar  tilt  he  affected.  He  was  not 
quite  sure  now  that  he  had  had  the  best  of  this  bout. 

"The  English  have  their  peculiarities  like  everybody,"  re- 
plied Kerr  indifferently.  "It  does  them  good  to  hear  about 
them." 

Lorenzo  stood  for  a  moment  wrapt  in  thought. 

"Enough  for  this  morning,"  he  said  abruptly,  holding  out 
his  hand.  "I  will  see  you  later.  That  man  Boisragon  is 
after  railways  too,  and  is  rather  clever."  And  with  that 
parting  shot  he  left  Peter  Kerr  to  his  own  devices. 

Kerr  himself  sat  most  of  the  day  writing  and  working.  By 
late  afternoon  he  had  completed  and  despatched  a  sheath  of 
telegrams  and  arranged  a  new  mass  of  notes.  Then,  as 
the  shadows  came,  tired  yet  a  little  elated  he  sat  for  a  long 
while  looking  over  the  verandah  on  to  the  street,  motionless 
and  wondering  what  the  future  would  bring.  In  the  fading 
daylight  this  indeed  seemed  a  land  of  contradictions  and  half- 
effects. 

Ten  thousand  miles  away,  Sir  James  Barker  sat  the  very 
same  day  with  Kerr's  decoded  message  in  his  hand — for  the 
difference  in  time  allows  of  the  anomaly  that  a  telegram 
despatched  from  Far  East  to  Far  West  should  arrive  before 
the  hour  it  is  despatched.  Sir  James  Barker  compared  this 
telegram  with  some  news  he  had  just  received  from  Brus- 
sels, and  then  smiled  complacently.  Like  a  spider  in  the 
centre  of  a  web,  he  could  estimate  with  some  exactitude  the 
fate  of  those  who  were  buzzing  noisily  far  away  on  the  outer 
rim.  He  had  set  everything  in  motion  he  could  think  of. 
Brussels  was  now  offering  to  place  him  confidentially  among 
the  underwriters  of  a  three-hundred-million-franc  Chinese 
railway  loan  which  Belgian  agents  believed  they  would 


i46  THE  HUMAN   COBWEB 

secure  before  the  end  of  the  year.  As  he  had  not  heard 
lately  from  Jerkins  and  New  York,  Barker  rapidly  sum- 
marized the  news  he  had  received  and  ordered  it  to  be 
telegraphed  at  once  to  America.  Then  he  sent  out  to  inquire 
what  general  market  news  there  might  be  regarding  the  Far 
East. 

He  learnt  with  surprise  that  the  feeling  of  the  day — that 
remarkable  market-feeling  which  quicker  than  anything  else 
discloses  all  political  possibilities  and  probabilities — was  dis- 
tinctly uneasy. 

It  was  almost  becoming  oddly  complicated  in  China,  it  was 
said.  The  City  was  full  of  Chinese  rumours  for  no  particu- 
lar reason.  In  the  Far  East  the  pace  was  said  to  be 
perceptibly  quickening — great  things  were  in  the  making. 
Yet  no  one  had  any  very  definite  news;  no  one  knew  exactly 
what  it  meant.  There  were  just  rumours,  vague  and  curious 
rumours,  which,  like  the  vapours  of  early  morning,  would 
either  be  dissipated  by  the  rising  sun,  or  might  thicken  to 
stormy  weather. 


CHAPTER  VIII 

"On  n'imagine  pas  corabien  il  faut  d'esprit  pour 
n'etre  pas  ridicule." — CHAMFORT. 

As  the  guests  trooped  into  the  great  Legation  dining-room  in 
strictly  ordered  precedence,  their  somewhat  severe  diplomatic 
air  began  gradually  to  melt  and  give  place  to  refreshingly 
natural  laughter  and  conversation.  Possibly  the  sprinkling 
of  strangers  among  them  that  evening  contributed  mate- 
rially to  this  happy  result.  Strangers  in  a  rfiuch-bored 
assembly  generally  have  a  good  effect;  to  borrow  a  simile 
from  the  modern  dairy,  they  seem  to  act  the  part  of  sep- 
arators— that  is,  they  separate  the  cream  from  the  milk. 
Of  course  bright  people,  like  cream,  always  rise  to  the  top; 
and  yet  if  they  are  left  undisturbed — that  is,  unseparated 
from  that  which  must  inevitably  turn  bad — they  will  become 
sour  too.  Therefore  the  office  performed  by  strangers  is  a 
very  important  one. 

At  the  start  it  had  been  immensely  boring,  as  it  always 
must  be  where  a  select  list  of  exiles  meet  at  too  frequent 
intervals  and  attempt  to  forget  themselves  in  perfunctory 
pleasure.  Brillat-Savarin,  who  knew  something  about  the 
physiology  of  taste,  once  wrote:  "To  invite  any  one  as  a 
guest  is  to  be  responsible  for  his  happiness  all  the  time  that 
he  is  under  your  roof."  But  Brillat-Savarin  lived  in  the 
gayest  country  in  the  world :  he  had  never  suffered  exile  in  a 
very  small  community.  To  make  your  neighbour  feel 
pleased  with  himself — to  make  yourself  responsible  for  his 
happiness — when  you  have  possibly  been  employed  up  to  a 
very  few  minutes  before  the  dinner-hour  in  forestalling 
his  most  cherished  scheme,  is  more  than  difficult.  Only  very 
exceptionable  people  like  Talleyrand  can  congratulate  a  per- 
son they  feel  like  strangling!  Generally,  of  course,  diplo- 


i48  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

macy  is  largely  a  game — a  sort  of  unending  posturing  and 
cajoling  in  the  interests  of  your  particular  fatherland,  so 
that  its  point  of  view  may  be  cordially  endorsed  and  ap- 
plauded just  because  it  is  made  to  appear  so  very  reason- 
able. It  is,  or  should  be,  gastronomical  art — plus  a  top  hat, 
a  frock  coat,  and  a  pleasant  wife,  leaving  the  clever  telegraph- 
wires  to  do  the  rest. 

But  in  the  almost  forgotten  times  of  which  we  write, 
things  had  been  moving  too  rapidly  and  in  too  serious  a 
manner  for  this  traditional  attitude  to  be  properly  observed. 
There  had  been  much  feeling  and  passion.  Men,  even 
though  they  may  have  then  only  dimly  realized  how  great 
were  the  stakes,  had  become  honestly  absorbed  in  the  curious 
game  proceeding  under  their  very  eyes.  After  years  of 
routine  intriguing,  such  as  always  goes  on  in  every  typical 
Oriental  capital,  a  wonderful  period  of  open  scramble  had 
set  in  forecasting  a  sensational  change  in  political  geography. 
No  wonder  that  the  donning  of  dinner-clothes  did  nothing 
to  change  thoughts  and  ambitions.  It  might  have  done  so, 
had  there  been  any  youth.  But  in  diplomacy,  properly 
speaking,  there  is  outwardly  no  youth — it  is  all  grey  hairs, 
or  at  least  grey  looks  and  grey  thoughts,  which  is  much  the 
same  thing. 

Now,  however,  because  of  the  number  of  strangers  present, 
an  unwonted  and  strange  gaiety  gradually  invaded  the  hand- 
some dining-room — a  gaiety  which  caused  some  of  the  older 
men  to  turn  their  heads  in  wonder,  as  if  they  could  hardly 
believe  such  good  spirits  possible.  Yet  the  splendid  Chinese 
ceiling,  full  of  rich  colouring  arranged  in  quaint  mathe- 
matical designs  of  Turkish  or  Persian  origin,  was  made 
to  look  down  on  gay  and  festive  gatherings.  Once  upon  a 
time  Manchu  princes  and  princesses,  clothed  in  gorgeous 
robes,  must  have  gathered  here  and  banqueted  in  royal 
style,  for  this  had  been  a  ducal  palace  in  the  days  before 
the  coming  of  the  white-skinned  foreigner  and  had  only 
been  acquired  by  force  of  arms.  The  great  folding-doors, 
leading  into  the  room  from  each  side,  were  latticed  so  as  to 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  149 

match  the  Eastern  effect  given  by  the  ceiling;  massive 
pillars  of  sang-de-bceuf  had  been  introduced  where  the  room 
had  been  lengthened,  and  lent  additional  attraction  to  the 
general  colour-scheme;  whilst  the  servants  in  their  brilliant 
official  clothing  and  tasselled  hats  completed  a  background 
which  was  as  picturesque  as  it  was  unusual. 

Yet  most  people  in  the  room  saw  nothing  of  all  this,  in 
spite  of  their  gaiety.  They  talked  of  this  country  and 
everything  in  it  mainly  as  if  it  were  bric-a-brac,  which  would 
be  finally  disposed  of  to  the  highest  bidder — that  is,  to  the 
bidder  who  would  be  the  boldest.  The  medley  of  voices, 
now  rising  louder  and  louder,  might  have  been  the  voices 
of  buyers  and  sellers  calling  their  terms  and  anxious  only  to 
complete  a  bargain.  It  was  doubtless  right  and  proper — and 
very  logical — that  this  should  be  so ;  for  had  not  even  mediae- 
val China  only  served  as  a  useful  name  for  porcelain? 

The  French  windows  of  this  stately  dining-room  opened 
on  to  a  broad  and  silent  courtyard,  which  was  adorned  with 
a  pair  of  immense  Chinese  stone  lions.  Every  one  instinct- 
ively loved  those  lions — at  first  sight.  They  did  not  re- 
semble so  much  the  noble  king  of  animals  as  he  is  pictured 
in  his  wild  haunts,  as  a  fantastic  and  peculiar  Chinese  pug- 
dog  type,  which  certainly  would  not  harm  either  friend  or 
enemy.  Each  dignified  animal  sat  there  squatting  on  its 
haunches,  one  holding  in  a  clumsy  paw  the  male  symbol,  the 
other  the  female.  Mounted  on  great  blocks  of  stone,  they 
lent  a  princely  air  to  the  avenue  over  which  they  endlessly 
watched.  Scattered  here  and  there  in  the  courtyard,  and 
swinging  on  tridents  of  bamboo,  were  great  mediaeval- 
looking  lanterns  of  oil-paper  belonging  to  those  who  had 
lighted  the  way  for  the  numerous  chair-bearers  and  carters. 
These  gauze-like  globes,  though  they  only  contained  an  ordi- 
nary candle,  were  so  big  that  two  men  could  hardly  encircle 
one  with  their  arms;  and  yet  the  light  they  shed  only  served 
to  illumine  a  little  patch  of  ground,  leaving  shadows  and 
darkness  between  them.  On  each  was  painted  in  great 
square  characters,  oddly  flattened  down  so  as  to  allow  room 


150  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

for  such  long  descriptions,  the  full  name,  titles,  and  resi- 
dence of  the  master.  Among  these  lanterns  numberless 
chair-coolies  were  squatting  in  untidy  groups,  smoking  little 
pipes  which  they  were  continually  knocking  out  on  the 
ground  with  a  sharp  clicking,  whilst  they  conversed  in  pecu- 
liarly cavernous  undertones.  Near  the  gate-house  were  the 
chairs  and  the  carts  and  the  mules  and  the  outriders'  ponies, 
mixed  in  close  company  with  other  bands  of  people  who  were 
idly  watching  them,  or  peacefully  sleeping  in  every  possible 
and  impossible  attitude.  Everything  was  prepared  in  the 
courtyard  so  as  to  wait  indefinitely  on  the  pleasure  of  the 
masters  and  mistresses  within.  It  might  last  three  hours,, 
or  five  hours,  or  seven  hours — who  knew  or  cared? 

Perhaps  it  was  the  peculiar  novelty  of  these  things  which 
had  made  the  strangers,  after  an  initial  pause,  bubble  with 
such  irrepressible  gaiety.  They  could  get  occasional  glimpses 
through  the  open  windows  of  the  picturesque  massing  of  this 
passive  and  novel  serving-world  scattered  among  the  dim 
globes  of  oil-paper,  and  the  sight  filled  them  with  a  desire 
for  information  on  many  subjects.  And  since  any  one  may 
impart  with  safety  to  strangers  all  sorts  of  strangely  inaccu- 
rate things,  quite  a  number  of  generally  silent  people  were 
listening  in  some  admiration  to  their  own  voices  and  ex- 
plaining this  and  that,  with  remarkable  fluency.  Not  even 
the  sombre  and  preoccupied  air  of  the  host,  who  answered 
everything  in  abrupt  monosyllables,  or  the  whole-hearted 
energy  with  which  the  hostess  was  devoting  herself  to  her 
own  dinner,  could  keep  down  the  rising  tide.  People  wanted 
to  talk  a  great  deal — they  would  talk — and  so  the  voices 
of  the  bright  and  the  dull  rose  and  fell  in  questions  and 
answers. 

"You  are  not  at  the  hotel?"  asked  a  sallow-faced  man,  who 
had  been  observing  all  this  animation  with  an  air  of 
amused  sarcasm,  speaking  to  the  lady  he  had  taken  in  to 
dinner. 

"Oh,  dear,  no,"  she  answered  with  a  laugh.    "I  was  saved 


THE  HUMAN  COBWEB  151 

from  that  by  a  kind  friend.  They  tell  me  the  hotel  is 
a  rather  remarkable  place." 

The  sallow-faced  man  smiled  enigmatically,  and  stroked 
his  wispy  moustache,  as  he  considered  the  question.  It  was 
hard  to  know  what  his  thoughts  really  were,  for  he  was 
one  of  those  who  keep  their  thoughts  hidden.  Also  he  was 
peculiarly  deliberate — an  attitude  which  is  inevitably  dis- 
concerting and  does  not  make  for  geniality. 

"Remarkable,  no — that  is  not  the  word,"  he  said  at  length. 
"But  the  proprietor  Carnot  is  rather  remarkable.  He  has 
marvellous  power  over  Chinese.  And  not  only  is  Carnot 
remarkable,  but  he  also  has  remarkable  guests.  Therefore 
it  would  be  more  correct  to  say  that  the  contents  of  the 
hotel  is  remarkable.  In  some  respects  it  is  pure  opera  bouffe. 
They — the  contents,  I  mean — are  mostly  looking  for  con- 
cessions, but  some  are  looking  for  other  things." 

"Oh!"  exclaimed  the  lady. 

His  partner  showed  such  interest  in  this  exclamation  that 
the  sallow-faced  man  smiled  in  triumph  to  himself.  He 
was  always  setting  traps  like  this — for  people  of  a  certain 
sort. 

"Some,"  he  explained,  setting  his  thin  lips  together,  "are 
looking  for  quiet." 

"Oh!"  said  the  lady  again. 

She  was  what  he  called  very  English,  which  covered  a 
multitude  of  failings  and  prejudices.  A  doubtful  expression 
having  come  over  her  face,  showing  that  she  did  not  desire 
his  confidences,  the  sallow-faced  man  became  more  pleased 
than  ever. 

"Well,  we  shall  see  them  all  to-night,"  he  continued  easily, 
as  if  his  companion  had  actually  asked  for  more.  "We  shall 
see  the  concession-hunters  and  the  others.  They  are  a  curious 
band.  If  you  like  I  will  classify  for  you  in  advance:  I  am 
rather  good  at  that,  and  then  you  will  be  able  to  recognize 
them." 

The  lady  murmured  something  unintelligible.    But  the  sal- 


152  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

low-faced  man,  perhaps  owing  to  the  curious  gaiety  in  the 
air,  had  become  irrepressible.  Most  people  hated  him,  be- 
cause he  could  really  be  very  bitter.  To  revenge  themselves, 
they  said  that  he  was  a  brute  who  beat  his  wife. 

"Perhaps  you  can  tell  me,  since  you  are  English,"  he  be- 
gan again.  "You  must  remember  I  am  only  a  foreigner  and 
I  want  to  know.  Do  men  in  England  often  take  the  name 
of  Smith" — he  dwelt  on  the  word  with  disagreeable  emphasis 
— "for  any  particular  object  when  they  go  abroad?  There 
is  a  gentleman  called  Smith" — once  more  he  paused — "at  the 
hotel  who  goes  riding  every  day,  and  beside  him  runs  a 
lady  whose  name  I  do  not  know,  but  who  wears  short  skirts 
and  has  short  curls.  It  is  very  interesting  for  this  place, 
and  we  all  want  to  know  why  he  should  be  named  Smith." 

The  sallow-faced  man's  partner  was  divided  between  an- 
noyance and  a  desire  to  laugh.  She  did  not  like  the  peculiar 
tone  of  this  man,  and,  not  understanding  his  motives,  she 
was  ill  at  ease.  Yet  the  way  he  described  things  was  amus- 
ing. After  a  moment's  thought,  she  decided  to  smile  vaguely. 
A  smile  is  a  woman's  securest  fortress. 

"I  suppose  it  is  just  possible,"  she  said,  "that  his  name  is 
Smith.  Why  are  you  so  interested  ?" 

A  lull  in  the  general  conversation  occurred  at  this  very" 
moment ;  and,  as  so  often  happens,  these  last  words  fell  on  the 
ears  of  half  a  dozen  listeners. 

"How  curious,"  said  a  man  sitting  two  or  three  places 
from  her,  leaning  quickly  forward.  "There  is  some  one 
who  really  knows.  I  knew  I  was  right — his  name  is  Smith, 
you  see." 

The  lady,  who  did  not  know  the  speaker,  coloured  with 
annoyance;  she  was  now  really  angry  with  the  sallow- 
faced  man.  Instead  of  apologizing  or  helping  her,  he  turned 
and  laughed  in  open  delight. 

"You  realize  what  you  have  done,"  he  gasped  in  the  midst 
of  his  laughter.  "You  have  testified  to  your  countryman's 
bona  fides;  you  will  now  be  quoted  as  the  authority.  If  it 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  153 

turns  out  later  that  Mr.  Smith  is  somebody  else  you  will  be 
blamed." 

The  sallow-faced  man  laughed  in  a  crackly  voice  for  a 
long  time.  He  was  genuinely  delighted.  It  was  seldom  his 
methods  were  so  signally  rewarded. 

The  lady's  indignant  reply  was  drowned  in  the  noise  made 
by  a  loud-voiced  military  attache  who  was  trying  to  make 
himself  amiable  after  the  foreign  fashion  by  drinking  the 
health  of  his  hostess  across  the  table. 

"Madame,  madame,  votre  sante"  he  was  saying  at  regular 
intervals  with  his  glass  upraised.  For  a  long  time,  though 
he  raised  his  voice  more  and  more  until  it  attracted  general 
attention,  his  hostess,  who  was  short-sighted  and  had  her 
nose  almost  on  her  plate,  did  not  hear  him. 

"She  is  terribly  short-sighted,"  whispered  some  one  to  an 
elderly  man  next  to  him. 

"That  does  not  explain  her  deafness  or  her  appetite,"  rudely 
rejoined  his  companion,  who  did  not  love  her.  Then  they 
began  discussing  the  matter  sotto  voce  in  French. 

"Vous  savez,  pour  moi,"  confided  the  elderly  man,  speaking 
with  a  strong  German  accent,  "cest  absolument  comme  les 
cochons  mangent,  c  est  a  dire  avec  le  nez  dans  le  plat.  Vous 
direz,  peut-etre  que  c'est  malhonnete  de  ma  part}  mais  avouez 
que  cest  la  verite" 

A  neighbour  who  was  a  little  deaf  overheard  part  of  this 
and  had  to  have  it  all  repeated  twice  for  his  benefit  before  he 
understood.  When  he  finally  grasped  it,  he  went  into  fits  of 
half-suppressed  laughter. 

"Un  cochon — cest  ban,  cest  bon"  he  repeated  in  mutilated 
French,  looking  with  intense  amusement  across  the  table. 

The  loud-voiced  military  attache  had  at  last  succeeded  in 
his  object,  by  stopping  all  general  conversation;  and  his 
hostess,  who  appeared  to  be  in  a  vile  temper,  hardly  ac- 
knowledged his  amiable  advances  with  more  than  a  brief 
nod.  Having  temporarily  satisfied  her  appetite,  she  was 
now  casting  furious  glances  at  the  Chinese  servants,  who 


154  THE   HUMAN    COBWEB 

were  becoming  more  and  more  noisy ;  and  rattling  her  knife 
and  fork  against  her  plate,  she  attempted  to  coerce  them  into 
better  manners.  But  they  had  been  left  uncontrolled  too 
long;  and  after  the  manner  of  their  kind,  they  would  now 
make  a  great  noise  until  the  very  end. 

"It  is  abominably  gay  and  .noisy  to-night  for  Peking,"  ven- 
tured somebody  else. 

"Yes,"  replied  his  neighbour,  "we  are  not  only  thirty-six  at 
dinner,  but  more  than  one  hundred  people  are  coming  in 
afterwards.  One  hundred — think  of  it.  It  is  an  invasion !" 

"What  is  there  going  to  be — dancing?" 

"I  suppose  so — and  gossiping.  It  is  so  warm  now  that 
one  can  at  least  escape  into  the  garden." 

"And  breathe  the  delicious  Peking  dust,"  interrupted  the 
other  man  with  a  sarcastic  laugh. 

"Well,"  rejoined  the  other,  continuing  his  own  train  of 
thought,  "I  have  had  enough  of  this  much-vaunted  Peking. 
Frankly,  it  is  too  historic  for  me." 

"Still  it  is  interesting — marvellously  interesting  at  the  pres- 
ent moment  on  the  political  side." 

There  was  a  moment  of  silence,  whilst  the  first  speaker 
eyed  his  companion  a  little  suspiciously. 

"I  suppose  you  are  very  busy  just  now,"  he  ventured  cau- 
tiously at  last. 

"Oh,  yes,  but  not  very  much  more  than  usual,"  answered 
the  other  indifferently.  "What  I  want  to  know  is  whether 
there  will  not  be  internal  complications.  Will  there  be 
a  revolution,  or  a  coup  d'etat,  or  something  exciting  like 
that  ?  It  can't  go  on  like  this  forever." 

"What  do  you  mean?" 

"Well,  we  are  all  insisting  so  much  that  presently  there 
will  come  a  point  when  there  is  nothing  more  to  take.  We 
will  have  soon  eaten  all  the  cake,  and  you  know  what 
happens  when  one  does  that." 

He  folded  his  arms  across  his  stomach  and  made  a  grimace. 

His  companion  gave  such  a  loud  laugh  at  this  unembar- 
rassed pantomime,  that  the  black-browed  host  looked  up 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  155 

frowningly,  as  if  he  suspected  they  had  been  making  fun  of 
him. 

"Don't  be  alarmed  about  that  just  yet,"  he  replied.  "Be- 
sides, we  have  been  eating  the  cake.  The  aches  and  pains 
will  be  ours.  And  then,  again,  we  are  only  at  the  com- 
mencement, and  there  is  going  to  be  lots  more  of  this  sort 
of  thing.  I  have  never  believed  in  China,  and  I  believe  less 
to-day  than  I  have  ever  believed  before." 

At  the  other  end  of  the  table  things  were  proceeding  very 
gaily. 

"Monsieur  de  Boyar,  Monsieur  de  Boyar,"  called  a  lady 
with  a  fantastic  aigrette  to  a  thin  man  with  two  big  decora- 
tions which  seemed  to  weigh  him  down. 

"Countess,"  he  replied  immediately. 

"We  want  you  to  explain  why  the  Peking  streets  are  so 
beautifully  lighted." 

"Why?"  he  riposted  tragically,  dropping  his  knife  and  fork 
and  crossing  his  arms.  "It  is  doubtless  owing  to  exactly  the 
same  reasons  which  cause  the  sun  to  shine — that  is,  because 
the  Emperor  desires  it." 

He  had  told  the  story  fifty  times  already;  but  everybody 
was  willing  to  enjoy  it  just  as  much  on  this  fifty-first  occa- 
sion. 

"The  Emperor,"  he  began,  "heard  with  displeasure  that  the 
Peking  streets  were  very  dark  and  dangerous  at  night.  So 
one  day  he  seized  his  Vermilion  Pencil  and  wrote,  'Let  one 
million  taels  be  spent  on  lighting  the  streets.  Tremble  and 
obey.' 

"The  edict  was  duly  handed  to  the  Grand  Council.  The 
Grand  Councillors  deliberated  that  very  day  in  the  Palace 
on  this  measure  and  forthwith  issued  instructions  to  the 
Captain-General  of  the  Nine  Gates.  'The  Emperor,'  they 
said,  'out  of  the  generosity  of  his  heart  has  decreed  that  five 
hundred  thousand  taels  be  spent  at  once  on  the  lighting  of  the 
streets.  Let  this  be  obeyed.' 

"It  was  the  duty  of  the  Captain-General  of  the  Nine  Gates 
to  draft  instructions  to  the  Prefect  of  the  city.  He  wrote: 


I56  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

"  'It  has  been  decreed  by  the  Emperor  that  three  hundred 
thousand  taels  be  spent  on  the  lighting  of  the  streets.  In- 
struct your  subordinates  accordingly.' 

"The  Prefect  of  the  city  called  the  district  Magistrates 
together  and  explained  to  them  what  they  had  to  do. 

"  'You  have  one  hundred  thousand  taels,'  he  said,  'to  spend 
on  the  lighting  of  the  streets.  See  that  the  Wards  carry  out 
this  noble  measure  at  once.' 

"The  Magistrates  bowed  and  withdrew  and  sent  orders 
to  the  Wards. 

"  'Five  thousand  taels,'  they  said,  'is  to  be  spent  on  this 
good  work.  Attend  to  it  at  once.' 

"The  headmen  of  the  Wards  likewise  soon  acted.  For 
them  it  was  very  simple.  Without  delay  every  householder 
was  ordered  under  pain  of  summary  punishment  to  display 
a  light  outside  his  house  between  the  hours  of  sunset  and 
sunrise.  So  grumblingly  the  householders  bought  very  small 
oil-lamps,  and  put  them  up,  wondering  why  this  expense 
should  be  thrown  on  them.  And  in  this  way  the  city  was 
beautifully  lighted. 

"Now  the  beggars  of  Peking  were  much  disturbed  at  this 
startling  development.  Nothing  like  it  had  been  seen  before. 
The  beggars'  guilds  met  and  discussed  the  matter  very  sol- 
emnly. 'How  comes  it,'  they  inquired,  'that  all  this  good 
bean-oil  is  being  consumed  for  such  a  useless  purpose  ?'  And 
as  no  one  could  find  a  satisfactory  answer  they  too  decided 
on  action. 

"That  night  the  ten  thousand  hungry  beggars  of  Peking 
assembled  at  their  stations,  and  without  haste  or  flurry 
methodically  extinguished  the  little  lamps,  and  eagerly  drank 
the  beautiful  warm  bean-oil!  It  had  a  sweet  taste.  The 
householders  the  next  day  refused  to  find  more  oil.  As 
the  incident  was  considered  closed  nobody  paid  any  more 
attention  to  the  matter;  and  this  is  the  historic  reason  why 
Peking,  as  the  Countess  says,  is  so  beautifully  lighted  to- 
day." 

"Bravo,  bravo!"  every  one  near  him  called,  much  amused. 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  157 

"Now  that  is  what  I  call  a  good  story,"  said  one  of  the 
strangers,  "I  shall  certainly  write  it  down  immediately  I 
get  home  to-night." 

A  pretty  but  rather  faded  girl  turned  round  in  her  chair 
and  looked  out  of  the  open  windows  as  the  curious  clatter- 
rattle  of  Peking  cart-wheels  was  wafted  in. 

"People  are  beginning  to  arrive  already,"  she  explained  to 
a  very  young  man  next  to  her. 

"Indeed,"  he  said  with  a  supercilious  air,  "they  are  more 
lucky  than  we  are." 

"How  so?"  she  inquired,  trying  to  make  herself  amiable. 

The  supercilious  youth  gave  a  thin  laugh. 

"Need  you  ask?"  he  said.  "We  have  taken  nearly  two 
hours  already — two  mortal  hours.  And  not  only  that,  but 
because  there  are  so  many  important  people  present,  we  are 
miles  away  from  the  host  and  hostess,  and  therefore  we  get 
bad  champagne  and  worse  claret." 

"How  can  you  tell?" 

The  youth  laughed  a  second  time.  "I  will  tell  you,  but  do 
not  say  it  was  me.  In  this  house,  when  there  are  a  lot  of 
people,  below  First  Secretaries  they  always  give  cheap  wines. 
Think  of  it !  It  is  a  nice  sort  of  hospitality.  To-night  I  am 
sure  of  it,  for  I  have  looked  at  the  labels." 

The  youth  nodded  familiarly  far  down  the  table  to  an 
iron-jawed  man  and  made  a  wry  face  as  he  lifted  his  cham- 
pagne-glass to  his  lips.  The  iron- jawed  man  allowed  a  dis- 
creet smile  to  steal  over  his  features.  The  youth,  being  rich, 
was  encouraged  by  his  chief  in  all  his  little  ways. 

"You  see  he  understands,"  explained  the  attache  to  the  girl 
after  this  little  pantomime.  "You  see  what  one  has  to 
suffer." 

"I  think  you  are  rather  rude,  you  know,"  she  said  in  reply. 
"When  you  have  eaten  a  man's  salt " 

"Oh,  I  say,"  he  protested,  "but  I  am  speaking  of  bad  wine 
— it  is  undrinkable.  What  do  you  expect  me  to  do?  I  am 
sure  I  shall  be  sick  to-morrow,  and  I  hate  being  sick." 

A  great  drawing-back  of  chairs  fortunately  at  last  took 


158  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

place.  The  hostess,  having  entirely  satisfied  her  own  won- 
derful appetite,  had  announced  loudly  that  it  was  becoming 
late;  and  continental  fashion  the  men  were  giving  their  arms 
to  the  ladies  and  escorting  them  out.  Numbers  of  other 
people  were  already  arriving,  whilst  the  sounds  of  a  band, 
blowing  tentative  notes  on  their  instruments,  added  to  the 
growing  din  which  was  soon  wafted  in  to  the  house  through 
the  windows.  Many  more  carts  and  chairs  had  arrived, 
with  their  attendants  advertising  each  arrival  by  their  uproar. 
At  last  this  shouting  and  calling  became  so  marked  that  some 
men  who  were  smoking  and  drinking  coffee  and  liqueurs  on 
the  verandah  peered  out. 

"Either  this  is  the  coup  d'etat  arriving  in  state,"  said  a 
facetious  person,  "or  it  is  Li  Hung  Chang!  You  will  ob- 
serve that  it  can  only  be  one  of  two  things.  His  servants 
always  give  the  impression  that  a  rebellion  is  in  progress." 

Amidst  laughter  all  leaned  their  heads  out  to  see.  It  was 
indeed  no  other  person  than  the  great  Li  Hung  Chang.  His 
large  mounted  escort  rode  right  up  through  the  spacious 
courtyard  to  the  very  front  door,  hustling  every  one  else 
roughly  aside  in  order  that  the  supreme  importance  of  their 
own  master  might  be  rightly  understood. 

Several  of  the  younger  men  went  back  and  told  the  ladies 
that  they  were  going  to  have  the  pleasure  of  seeing  the  great 
Li  Hung  Chang.  A  French  lady,  totally  unimpressed,  gath- 
ered up  her  skirts  in  alarm. 

"Mais  il  est  degoutant,  ce  vieux  Li"  she  exclaimed  volubly. 
"11  crache  partout!  Moi  je  vais  me  sauver  des  quil  entre." 

She  made  as  if  she  would  really  run  off,  so  the  others  gath- 
ered round  her  protestingly.  If  she  went  they  would  all 
follow  too.  There  was  a  buzz  of  protests  and  silly  little 
cries,  as  some  sought  to  restrain  a  general  sauve-qui-peut. 

Whilst  they  were  still  discussing  this  important  question,  a 
growing  murmur  came  from  the  hall.  Their  host  was 
escorting  the  great  man  with  due  ceremony  from  the  very 
entrance  of  his  house  to  the  spot  where  he  would  sit  the  whole 
evening,  smoking  an  immensely  long  pipe  and  calmly  expec- 


THE  HUMAN  COBWEB  159 

torating.  Full  preparation  had  fortunately  been  made  for 
this  strange  performance;  and  as  the  far-famed  Viceroy, 
who  was  reputed  not  only  to  wield  more  power  than  any 
other  man  in  China,  but  to  be  fabulously  rich  as  well,  entered 
the  room  supported  on  either  side  by  a  solicitous  retainer 
in  full  official  clothes  and  buttoned  hat,  the  host  led  him  in 
a  bee-line  to  a  massive  chair,  half  surrounded  by  Chinese 
flower-pots.  There  he  would  be  safe — for  the  furniture. 
The  old  man,  seeming  immensely  tall  for  a  Chinaman  even 
though  he  was  beginning  to  be  bowed  down  by  years,  cour- 
teously inclined  his  head  towards  the  assembled  company 
again  and  again  as  he  walked  slowly  forward.  Though 
some  of  his  habits  were  curious,  he  had  the  manner  of  the 
grand  seigneur.  He  paused  once  to  shake  hands  with  his 
hostess,  who,  yielding  to  the  peremptory  nods  of  her  hus- 
band, had  come  reluctantly  forward;  then  he  continued  on 
his  way,  until  he  had  seated  himself  with  a  sigh  of  relief 
on  his  great  chair.  He  was  simply  clad  in  silks  as  a  Chinese 
gentleman ;  there  was  nothing  save  his  remarkable  personality 
to  show  who  he  was.  Two  or  three  other  servants,  in  full 
official  dress,  who  had  followed  from  afar,  now  came  up 
and  handed  him  his  pipe  with  that  peculiar  trembling  Chinese 
care  which  shows  how  highly  unchallenged  authority  is  really 
held  in  a  land  of  Idssez-aller.  A  flood  of  Legation  servants, 
happy  to  be  able  to  serve  one  of  their  own  great  men  and 
no  outlander,  quickly  swarmed  round  him  with  cups  of  tea, 
trays  of  champagne,  and  boxes  of  sweetmeats  and  cigars. 
The  great  Viceroy  treated  all  these  with  nodding  indifference, 
leaving  it  to  his  own  people  to  secure  for  him  an  immense 
array  of  dishes  and  trays,  which  they  distributed  to  his  im- 
mediate neighbourhood  on  numerous  teapoys.  He  might 
or  might  not  wish  to  eat  and  drink.  Every  possibility  must 
be  provided  for.  Finally  settled  in  comfort,  with  this  both- 
ering crowd  departed,  the  old  man  puffed  contentedly  at 
his  long  pipe,  and  made  comments  now  and  again  in  a  loud 
hoarse  voice  which  carried  all  through  the  rooms.  He  was 
certainly  remarkable. 


160  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

A  hundred  eyes  looked  at  him  curiously.  He  it  was  who, 
the  confidential  archives  of  the  Legations  already  disclosed, 
had  really  prepared  everything  which  had  come  about  since 
the  close  of  the  disastrous  Japanese  war.  Largely  out  of 
spite  to  Japan  owing  to  the  fatal  termination  of  his  Korean 
adventure,  he  had  arranged,  when  he  had  been  in  Moscow  at 
the  Czar's  coronation  a  year  or  two  before,  the  true  basis 
of  the  Russian  railway  invasion  in  Manchuria,  and  thus  paved 
the  way  for  all  subsequent  developments.  People  in  those 
days  of  a  decade  ago  were  only  beginning  to  realize  what  this 
might  ultimately  mean;  but  as  they  gazed  at  the  immense 
frame  of  this  far-seeing  Chinese  Bismarck,  their  imagina- 
tions were  momentarily  lit  with  the  light  of  understanding. 
In  a  vague  way  the  feeling  possessed  this  indifferent  little 
diplomatic  world  that  a  master-man  had  come  among  them, 
contemptuous  of  them,  and  certain  that  he  was  fully  justi- 
fied in  such  contempt  from  the  mere  fact  that  distributed 
around  the  capital  over  millions  of  square  miles  of  territory 
were  vast,  latent  forces  which  some  day  would  obey  a  com- 
mon impulse  and  regain  in  a  few  efforts  what  had  been 
lost  in  decades  of  inertia. 

For  a  few  minutes,  whilst  the  host  and  his  secretaries  made 
conversation  to  the  great  man,  people  watched  him  atten- 
tively. Then  a  new  line  of  late  arrivals,  searching  for  the 
host  and  hostess,  broke  up  the  groups  which  had  formed,  and 
amidst  a  growing  murmur  and  movement  the  great  Viceroy 
was  gradually  forgotten. 


CHAPTER  IX 

"Nous  d6sirerions  peu  de  choses  avec  ardeur, 
si  nous  connaissions  parfaitement  ce  que  nous 
desirons." — LA  ROCHEFOUCAULD. 

PETER  KERR  was  among  the  late  arrivals.  He  had  been 
dining  elsewhere,  and  he  had  only  managed  to  excuse  himself 
after  several  attempts.  He  had  heard  that  this  was  to  be  a 
big  affair,  and  he  was  anxious  to  see  it. 

As  he  came  up  the  steps  of  the  broad  main  entrance,  at 
which  stood  a  group  of  gorgeous  but  rather  useless  servants, 
he  saw  going  in  just  ahead  of  him  a  little  dark  man  with  a 
beard,  accompanied  by  a  tall  woman.  Something  in  the 
poise  of  her  shoulders  caught  his  attention  at  once.  It 
seemed  to  him  that  she  walked  disdainfully — as  if  she  felt 
contempt  for  her  escort.  Kerr  followed  quickly.  Yes,  he 
was  sure — it  was  his  lady  of  the  verandah. 

With  an  easy  movement  she  drew  off  a  black  lace  mantilla, 
and  handed  it  without  a  word  or  a  look  to  her  husband. 
After  an  almost  imperceptible  pause  she  passed  from  the 
hall  into  the  reception-rooms,  and  was  lost  to  his  sight. 

Involuntarily  Peter  Kerr  stopped  and  walked  back  a  few 
steps,  as  if  he  had  changed  his  mind  about  going  into  the 
house.  Somehow  he  had  not  expected  to  meet  her  like  this — 
he  had  pictured  her  as  living  in  a  world  apart  from  this  little 
society  of  exiles  which  dined  and  wined  one  another  too  fre- 
quently. He  was  almost  disillusioned  by  seeing  her  walking 
in  ahead  of  him  like  any  other  person.  It  was  prosaic — 
unromantic — out  of  keeping  with  what  he  would  have  liked. 
Ever  since  his  curious  adventure,  she  had  been  shadowy,  un- 
realizable. He  had  never  seen  her  again,  not  even  on  the 
verandah.  She  had  carefully  shut  herself  off  from  all  possi- 
ble view  by  the  aid  of  screens.  And  now  here  she  was • 


162  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

"Hello,  Kerr,  what  are  you  doing  stuck  there?" 

The  cheery  voice  of  the  square-looking  American  Secretary 
of  Legation,  who  had  become  quite  a  friend  of  his,  sud- 
denly sounded  immediately  behind  him,  and  drew  him  out 
of  his  reverie.  The  American  was  standing  just  outside  the 
front  door  puffing  violently  at  a  cigar  which  was  only  half 
smoked.  He  took  the  cigar  from  his  mouth  and  eyed  it  af- 
fectionately after  he  had  spoken. 

"What  are  you  doing  stuck  there?"  he  repeated  in  his 
strong  rasping  voice. 

Kerr  laughed. 

"Waiting  for  somebody  to  go  in  with,"  he  replied  with  easy 
prevarication.  "There's  an  immense  crowd." 

"It's  a  beautiful  night,"  reflected  the  American,  "and  I  hate 
to  throw  this  away.  However,  I  suppose  it's  got  to  go,  un- 
less we  stay  camped  here  for  quite  a  spell." 

He  puffed  violently  for  a  few  seconds,  and  then  with  a  reso- 
lute movement  he  suddenly  hurled  his  enticing  weed  far 
away.  A  chair-coolie,  squatting  as  silently  as  an  image  under 
the  lea  of  one  of  the  great  pug-dog  lions,  rose  and  slipped 
away  after  it  like  a  shadow  in  the  night.  The  American 
observed  him  and  laughed. 

"I  guess  it's  gone  where  it  will  be  useful,"  he  said  in  his 
emphatic  manner.  "Now  for  the  line-up." 

He  squared  his  shoulders  in  mockery  and  then  linked  his 
arm  in  Kerr's.  Together  the  two  men  entered  the  hall, 
talking  about  the  curious  way  things  were  moving  in  the 
capital.  Kerr  kept  his  eyes  on  the  alert.  Where  had  she  gone 
to?  Though  he  glanced  everywhere,  he  could  find  no  trace 
in  the  drawing-rooms  of  this  graceful  Madame  Boisragon. 
In  company  with  their  host,  who  had  succeeded  in  disem- 
barrassing himself  of  the  Viceroy,  the  two  men  looked  in  on 
the  small  ballroom  where  an  opening  lancers  was  being 
danced.  Neither  was  she  there.  Together  the  two  men 
seized  the  opportunity,  in  one  of  the  intervals,  to  bid  the 
hostess  good  evening.  Then,  having  done  everything  that 
was  expected  of  them,  they  turned  and  sauntered  in  the  direc- 


THE   HUMAN  COBWEB  163 

tion  of  the  smoking-room.     Kerr  tried  to  drift  away,  but 
the  American  felt  talkative  and  would  not  let  him  go. 

"There's  a  devil  of  a  lot  of  tin  plate  and  pewter  out  to- 
night," he  drily  commented.  He  gave  a  nod  back  to  where 
they  had  been.  A  serried  mass  of  decorated  men,  fat  and 
thin,  old  and  young,  guarded  the  ballroom  entrance. 

"I  mean  all  those  plaques  and  decorations,"  he  continued. 
"They  amuse  me.  We  can't  have  them,  of  course,  but  it 
isn't  that  hurts.  I  don't  so  much  mind  an  old  fellow — 
a  really  respectable  old  fellow  with  a  beard,  a  corporation, 
and  grey  hairs — having  a  scarf  round  his  shirt-front  and  a 
line  of  decorations  over  his  heart,  but  it's  the  young  fellows 
that  get  on  my  nerves.  They  have  little  ones  that  look 
cheap.  With  us  Sousa's  men  have  them — bandsmen,  you 
know." 

Peter  Kerr  broke  into  a  laugh.  The  description  was  cer- 
tainly good. 

"I  suppose,"  he  replied,  "it  curbs  the  republican  spirit  in 
worn-out  monarchies.  A  little  tin  plate  and  pewter  some- 
times goes  a  long  way,  and  it  doesn't  cost  much." 

The  American  made  a  wry  face  and  pinched  Peter  Kerr's 
arm. 

"It's  about  time  you  fellows  threw  it  up.  What's  the 
sense  of  measuring  men  that  way?  See  here,  there  was  once 
a  man " 

He  began  a  fabulous  account  which  came  to  a  comical 
climax,  and  just  as  he  finished  the  little  dark  man  with  the 
beard  walked  in  a  melancholy  way  across  the  room. 

"Who  is  that  man?"  said  Kerr.    "Do  you  know  him?" 

He  watched  his  companion  narrowly,  curious  to  know  his 
attitude.  The  American  was  a  very  frank  fellow.  If  he 
had  heard  anything  he  would  certainly  say  it. 

"Oh,  that,"  he  said  indifferently,  "that's  a  man  named  Bois- 
ragon.  He's  running  a  big  railway  scheme — same  game  as 
you.  I  know  him  just  a  little,  but  he's  away  most  of  the 
time."  Kerr  was  reassured. 

"He  has  a  wife "  he  began  again.     The  American's 


164  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

quick  mind  instantly  leaped  to  an  understanding,  and  he 
grinned  broadly. 

"Say,  that  was  poor  work,"  he  protested,  pinching  Kerr's 
arm  again  in  his  joking  way.  "A  blind  man  could  have 
seen  clean  through  that.  Where's  the  wife — what  about 
her?" 

"That  is  what  I  want  to  find  out,"  rejoined  Kerr,  totally 
unembarrassed.  "I  want  you,  in  fact,  to  get  the  husband  to 
introduce  you,  and  then " 

"Anything  to  provide  amusement  for  a  friend,"  interrupted 
his  companion,  dropping  his  arm.  "Watch  out  how  quick 
I  work.  It  will  be  up  to  you  to  follow  my  lead." 

He  strolled  across  in  his  nonchalant  way  and  greeted  the 
ugly  little  man  before  he  had  time  to  evade  him.  The  ugly 
little  man  indeed  swerved  aside,  as  if  he  wished  to  be  left 
alone  like  a  number  of  other  people  who  were  moving  to 
and  fro  in  the  rooms  like  uneasy  spirits,  but  it  was  no  use. 
Kerr  saw  the  two  men  talking  for  a  time  together,  and  he 
wondered  what  his  American  was  saying.  Suddenly  he  saw 
him  take  the  other  man  by  the  arm  and  lead  him  off.  He 
seemed  almost  to  be  leading  him  against  his  will — but  that 
was  a  minor  consideration. 

He  saw  the  two  men  go  through  the  main  room  in  which 
was  sitting  China's  Grand  Old  Man,  and  then  he  saw  that 
they  went  out  to  a  verandah  which  looked  out  on  a  small 
inner  courtyard.  Understanding  that  he  would  have  to  wait 
a  little,  he  now  paused  with  interest  near  the  group  sur- 
rounding the  old  Viceroy,  and  wondered  whether  he  should 
not  avail  himself  of  this  opportunity  to  get  presented.  The 
great  Li  Hung  Chang  was  now  talking  volubly  in  an  im- 
mensely loud  voice,  apparently  quite  satisfied  with  his  sur- 
roundings, and  anxious  to  appear  good-humoured.  A  silky 
interpreter  turned  everything  he  said  alternately  into  Eng- 
lish and  French  with  the  greatest  fluency.  The  interpreter, 
a  man  from  the  southern  provinces,  was  distinctly  different 
in  appearance  to  the  other  tall  and  grave  Chinese  around  the 
Viceroy.  He  was  a  true  provengal,  small,  quick,  alert,  all 


THE   HUMAN  COBWEB  165 

eyes  and  ears.    Hardly  had  Li  Hung  Chang  finished  speaking 
before  his  smooth  voice  had  begun  again.    "The  Viceroy  says 

that  in  his  opinion "     Time  after  time  Kerr  heard  this 

stereotyped  opening,  and  stood  amused  at  the  caustic  manner 
in  which  this  Chinese  Bismarck  expressed  his  opinion  on  men 
and  things.  Since  many  standing  there  understood  some- 
thing of  the  vernacular,  the  most  the  interpreter  could  do 
was  to  modify  his  chief's  crudities  of  speech.  Several  times 
even  the  interpreter  hesitated ;  then  with  a  deprecating  smile 
he  quickly  recovered  himself  and  glibly  recited  something 
which  brought  ripples  of  laughter  from  the  cosmopolitan 
audience.  It  was  a  wonderful  exhibition  of  cleverness  and 
diplomacy;  for  the  interpreter  was  looking  out  for  pitfalls. 
At  some  recent  reception,  in  spite  of  all  attempts  to  palliate 
it,  there  had  been  a  very  unfortunate  contretemps.  A  lady 
professor  had  been  presented  to  Li  Hung  Chang.  The  old 
man,  seeing  that  she  was  young  and  pleasant-looking,  had 
promptly  asked  what  she  was  doing  in  Peking.  On 
learning  that  she  was  studying  art,  and  collecting  examples 
of  Chinese  paintings  and  porcelains  for  her  university,  he 
had  turned  to  his  interpreter  and  in  front  of  every  one  had 
said  gruffly,  "Well,  she  is  acting  stupidly.  Tell  her  to  go 
home  and  marry  quickly  so  as  to  have  many  babies.  That  is 
her  proper  business."  The  anecdote  speedily  became  so  cele- 
brated that  the  unfortunate  lady  had  to  disappear  before  her 
collections  were  complete. 

Kerr  waited  fully  ten  minutes  listening,  but  the  circle  round 
the  Viceroy  did  not  break  up,  and  so  he  abandoned  his  idea 
of  getting  presented.  He  strolled  slowly  away,  avoiding 
numerous  servants  in  flowing  robes  who  were  tempting  the 
unwary  with  the  champagne  which  had  so  distressed  the 
youthful  attache  at  the  dinner-table.  It  was  about  the  right 
time  now,  Kerr  calculated,  to  make  his  appearance;  and  so, 
without  further  hesitation,  he  went  straight  to  his  objective. 

He  recognized  at  once  the  American's  voice  coming  from 
an  angle  of  the  verandah  which  was  prettily  masked  by  some 
palms  and  pots  of  flowers.  People  who  had  finished  dancing 


1 66  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

were  passing  to  and  fro  and  saying  how  warm  it  was.  The 
American  was  talking  in  his  same  half-joking,  half-serious 
manner,  punctuating  his  sentences  with  short  laughs  and 
running  on  from  one  thing  to  another  with  the  greatest  ease. 
He  was  a  jovial  fellow  who  could  make  himself  at  home 
anywhere,  and  possessed  a  proper  republican  contempt  for 
every  one  who  stood  on  ceremony.  Plainly  he  was  talking 
against  time,  and  so  Kerr  came  forward  with  calculated  de- 
liberation. The  American  let  him  approach  within  meas- 
urable distance. 

"I  am  really  awfully  sorry,"  he  said  suddenly,  "but  duty 
is  duty,  and  I  must  find  my  Minister  for  a  moment.  Will 
you  allow  me  ?  How  lucky,  here  is  the  very  man !" 

He  got  up  and  called  to  Kerr. 

Without  waiting  for  an  answer,  he  turned  and  continued 
in  his  cordial  manner:  "If  you  will  allow  me,  I  would  like 
to  present  Mr.  Kerr — a  very  good  friend  of  mine  and  an 
excellent  fellow."  And  with  that  he  fled. 

Peter  Kerr  found  himself  murmuring  something  unintelli- 
gible. He  was  glad  that  the  lighting  was  so  discreet. 

"Won't  you  sit  down?"  said  the  lady  quietly,  rustling  her 
skirts.  "There  is  just  room  on  this  cane  seat." 

He  murmured  his  thanks,  and  wondered,  how  he  should  best 
break  the  ice.  She  was  treating  him  as  a  complete  stranger. 
The  situation  was  a  little  odd,  certainly.  The  last — the 
only  time — he  had  spoken  to  her  was  in  sufficiently  uncom- 
mon circumstances;  it  would  be  absurd  to  recur  at  once  to 
those  circumstances.  Yet — he  cleared  his  throat. 

"It  is  very  dull,  don't  you  think,  if  one  doesn't  dance," 
remarked  the  lady,  saying  with  amazing  resourcefulness  the 
most  natural  thing  in  the  world.  Perhaps  that  was  respon- 
sible for  his  next  speech: 

"I  have  found  it  very  exciting;  I've  been  trying  to  see  you 
for  days,  and  now " 

"Really,"  she  replied  briefly.  He  thought  that  her  ex- 
pression was  vacillating  between  a  pucker  and  a  smile — but 
it  was  too  dark  to  be  quite  sure. 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  167 

"My  courage  wasn't  equal  to  my  desire,"  he  continued, 
"or  else -I  should  not  have  wasted  the  last  half-hour."  He 
wished  she  would  say  something;  he  had  the  feeling  that  he 
had  been  too  abrupt.  Would  she  resent  it  ? 

"Since  we  know  one  another  properly,"  she  rejoined  at 
last,  in  her  same  calm  manner,  ignoring  what  he  had  just 
said,  "you  will  perhaps  tell  me  how  you  found  out  that  I 
was  here." 

He  laughed  with  a  recovered  sense  of  ease. 

"It  was  not  very  difficult,"  he  explained,  trying  to  make  out 
her  expression.  She  was  carefully  leaning  back,  however; 
still,  he  could  see  that  her  eyes  were  fixed  on  his.  The 
outlook  was  not  unpromising.  He  went  on : 

"I  had  the  pleasure  of  coming  to  the  front  door  immediately 
behind  you,  and  I  recognized  you  at  once  by  your  back. 
It  was  not  very  brilliant,  you  see.  It  did  not  require  the 
ability  of  a  Monsieur  Lecoq." 

She  laughed  a  little  and  shifted  her  position  ever  so  slightly. 

"That  is  only  half  the  answer." 

He  wondered  whether  it  would  be  wise  to  be  quite  frank. 

"Your  husband,"  he  began  tentatively,  moving  one  arm  back 
towards  the  drawing-rooms  in  an  explanatory  gesture. 

"Ah!"  she  exclaimed. 

"I  beg  your  pardon,"  he  said,  somewhat  surprised.  He  had 
taken  the  wrong  road,  he  was  now  quite  sure. 

"It  is  nothing,"  she  replied,  speaking  nevertheless  in  a 
different  voice.  "How  stupid  of  me  not  to  have  under- 
stood before." 

"You  see,"  he  proceeded,  trying  to  recover  the  ground  he 
felt  he  had  lost,  "I  did  not  know  that  I  should  have  the 
pleasure  of  meeting  you  out  in  Peking,  and  as  soon  as  I 
saw  you,  of  course  I  determined  to  get  to  know  you  in  the 
ordinary  way.  I  wished  to  learn  whether  you  had  got  over 
your  accident — whether  you  were  none  the  worse  for  it. 
It  was  the  natural  thing,  was  it  not?  That  was  my  sole 
reason." 

"It  was  very  kind  of  you,"  she  replied,  her  voice  showing 


1 68  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

that  she  had  forgotten  the  rest.     "The  little  cut  you  ban- 
daged so  well  is  hidden  under  here.    Can  you  see?" 

She  parted  her  dark  brown  hair  with  her  long  fingers,  and 
showed  him  how  she  had  skilfully  covered  over  the  place 
by  dressing  her  hair  lower  on  her  forehead. 

"It  is  already  almost  well,"  she  continued.  "Peking  must 
be  a  wonderful  place  for  healing.  It  looks  only  like  a 
scratch." 

"I  can  see  nothing,"  said  Kerr,  truthfully  enough,  since 
it  was  too  dark  to  see.  "Still,  I  almost  envy  the  healing 
properties  of  the  Peking  air." 

Something  in  her  look  tempted  him  to  proceed.  She  had 
become  a  little  stiff  again  in  her  attitude;  it  was  that  which 
egged  him  on. 

"I  mean  I  should  have  liked  to  play  the  doctor  again," 
he  continued.  "I  have  often  thought  of  that  little  midnight 
scene.  You  were  so  angry  with  me  at  first ;  you  were  willing 
to  make  me  responsible  for  everything — though  afterwards 
you  relented.  I  believe  I  shall  always  think  of  you  as  I 
saw  you  first." 

"Things  out  of  the  common  never  happen  exactly  in  the 
same  way  twice,"  she  rejoined  slowly,  with  assumed  in- 
difference. Yet,  in  spite  of  the  discreet  light,  he  was  sure 
she  had  coloured;  and  the  knowledge  gave  him  curious 
satisfaction. 

"Monsieur  Boisragon  must  have  been  very  sorry  to  hear 
about  it  when  he  came  back?"  he  remarked,  curious  to  con- 
firm an  impression  which  had  grown  up  in  his  mind. 

She  glanced  at  him  sharply,  as  if  wondering  why  he  had 
made  that  speech,  and  then  sat  up  stiffly. 

"My  husband,  who  returned  only  this  afternoon,"  she 
answered  coldly,  "knows  nothing  about  it.  There  was  no 
reason  to  tell  him,  and  I  shall  certainly  never  mention  it." 

Yes — he  was  sure  of  it  now.  So  he  quickly  turned  to  other 
things. 

"I  suppose  you  will  not  stay  in  Peking  all  through  the 
summer,"  he  inquired.  "The  heat  is  intolerable,  they  say, 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  169 

and  the  rains  unhealthy  enough  to  kill  a  cat.  See  how 
warm  it  is  even  to-night." 

"The  summer — do  not  talk  of  the  summer  yet  when  May 
has  scarcely  commenced,"  she  answered.  "The  country  is 
delicious  just  now  in  the  early  morning — it  is  almost  un- 
believable after  the  city — and  I  love  it." 

Kerr  sat  up  in  his  surprise. 

"The  country,"  he  murmured,  "there  is  only  one  way  of 
reaching  it — by  riding.  Therefore  you  ride  and  I  never 
knew  it!" 

There  was  such  hurt  surprise  in  his  voice  that  Madame 
Boisragon  suddenly  began  laughing  quietly. 

"I  ride  almost  every  morning,"  she  said;  "you  seem  very 
astonished  ?" 

"Astonished — certainly  I  am  astonished,"  he  confessed,  glad 
that  they  were  now  talking  naturally.  "I  thought  you  were 
a  sort  of  hermit — a  recluse  who  could  not  be  lured  forth 
from  your  cell.  When  one  never  sees  a  person  who  lives 
in  the  same  place — who  is  indeed  only  ten  yards  off — can  one 
be  blamed  for  thinking  that?  Is  it  possible  to  know  in 
which  direction  you  generally  ride?" 

She  had  a  provoking  way  of  sitting  silent  when  she  should 
have  spoken.  But  this  time  he  was  determined.  People 
were  coming  near  them  looking  for  seats;  they  might  be 
interrupted. 

"You  have  not  answered  me,"  he  said. 

"I  was  thinking,"  she  replied,  and  then  allowed  a  few  more 
seconds  to  go  by.  "You  know  the  Temple  of  the  Sun  and 
the  winding  road  which  leads  to  the  canal?"  she  continued 
finally.  "I  shall  ride  there  the  day  after  to-morrow  at 
half-past  six  in  the  morning." 

Then  she  got  up  and  held  out  her  hand.  He  caught  a 
full  view  of  her  as  she  passed  into  the  flood  of  light  stream- 
ing from  the  drawing-room  windows — and  he  was  infinitely 
glad  that  he  had  been  so  successful.  Yet  in  many  ways  this 
second  meeting  had  been  as  curious  as  the  first.  He  won- 
dered to  himself  a  good  deal  about  Madame  Boisragon  as  he 
mixed  again  with  the  crowd* 


CHAPTER  X 

"II  ne  faut  jamais  hasarder  la  plaisanterie, 
meme  la  plus  douce  et  la  plus  permise,  qu'avec 
des  gens  polis  ou  qui  ont  de  1'esprit." — LA 
BRUY&RE. 

"IT  was  apparently  very  gay  last  night — un  monde  fou?" 
said  Lorenzo,  adding  the  French  expression  to  his  English 
comment  to  give  it  special  point. 

Lorenzo  had  addressed  the  remark  to  Carnot  with  odd 
familiarity,  and  the  hotel-keeper  at  once  answered  him  in 
the  same  careless  way.  Carnot  had  soon  told  in  little 
snatches  all  he  knew  about  the  latest  Legation  entertain- 
ment. As  he  sat  busy  in  his  little  office  with  his  account- 
books  and  his  correspondence,  he  deemed  it  a  pleasant  thing 
to  amuse  himself  thus;  to  be  garrulous;  to  make  rude  com- 
ments; to  indulge  in  much  buffoonery. 

Carnot  always  knew  what  was  going  on  everywhere,  down 
to  the  most  intimate  details,  and  Lorenzo  delighted  to  hear 
him  talk.  It  was  doubtlessly  a  divine  dispensation  that  there 
should  be  such  a  person  in  the  town  to  play  the  part  of 
Figaro.  Once  a  lady  staying  in  the  hotel,  suffering  from 
the  prosaic  discomfort  of  corns,  had  asked  Carnot  if  there 
was  such  a  thing  as  a  local  chiropodist  to  be  had.  "Of 
course,"  Carnot  had  exclaimed,  "and  our  Chinaman  is  a 
good  corn-cutter  too.  He  is  busy  the  whole  time,  for  he  is 
immensely  popular.  He  is  almost  one  of  the  local  amuse- 
ments! On  Monday,  for  instance,  he  cuts  the  corns  of 
Madame  So-and-so;  on  Tuesday  those  of  the  wife  of  the 
Minister  of  That;  on  Wednesday  he  comes  here."  And 
continuing  in  this  amiable  vein  he  did  not  stop  until  he  had 
told  everything  he  knew  of  the  good  man's  clientele.  It 
had  been  a  bad  quarter  of  an  hour  for  the  lady  in  question, 
for  she  was  a  new  arrival  and  had  not  acquired  the  conti- 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  171 

nental  art  of  being  amazingly  interested  even  in  such  particu- 
larly personal  affairs.  She  was  in  fact  very  angry. 

Lorenzo,  however,  since  it  suited  his  purpose,  and  no  matter 
what  people  might  think,  placed  himself  with  calm  indiffer- 
ence on  the  same  footing  as  the  hotel-keeper,  and  openly 
delighted  in  such  talk;  and  now,  seated  in  the  little  hotel- 
office,  with  his  chair  tilted  back  and  the  usual  black  cigar 
between  his  teeth,  he  was  engaged  in  glean;ng  all  he  could. 
He  liked  to  spend  an  hour  or  two  of  the  morning  in  this 
way — it  was  like  getting  back  to  Europe,  he  said,  to  hear 
all  the  local  can-cans — the  growls  and  the  bites  and  the 
barks — for  out  on  the  street  there  were  only  billows  of  dust 
and  endless  blue-coated  people  hurrying  along — a  great, 
unthinking  yellow  world  absorbed  in  its  own  business,  and 
utterly  divided  from  the  little  white  world  living  in  its  midst. 

Also  at  this  hour  there  was  no  one  to  incommode  the  pair 
in  the  office  save  two  pale  Chinese  clerks  who,  seated  opposite 
each  other  at  a  diminutive  table,  added  up  endless  strings 
of  figures  to  a  sharp  clicking  of  the  abacus,  and  who  were  no 
more  noticed  than  had  they  been  lay  figures.  The  Italian, 
apart  from  his  innate  love  of  gossip,  really  believed  in  its 
intrinsic  value  in  such  a  place  as  this  strange  capital.  By 
means  of  gossip  he  was  constantly  picking  up  clues  which 
might  otherwise  have  eluded  him;  and  using  these  clues, 
he  was  nearly  always  in  a  position  to  know  exactly  what  was 
going  on  and  what  new  dangers  to  his  projects  might  sud- 
denly arise.  It  was  a  situation  specially  suited  to  a  person 
saturated  with  the  traditions  of  the  middle  ages,  as  well  as 
fully  alive  to  the  fact  that  this  is  the  Age  of  Gold. 

Carnot  would  not  have  been  so  obliging  to  every  one.  It 
was  because  Lorenzo  amused  him  very  much  by  his  extraor- 
dinary persistence  and  the  masterly  manner  in  which  he 
worked  with  any  material  which  came  into  his  hands  that 
he  liked  to  help  him.  Nothing  was  too  small  o^  too  big  for 
Lorenzo.  In  Carnot's  eyes,  the  Italian  had  remarkable 
ability — a  thing  which  he  was  only  prepared  to  grant  to 
very  few  of  those  who  so  constantly  sojourned  in  his  hostelry 


i72  THE   HUMAN    COBWEB 

in  quest  of  rapid  fortunes  to  be  won  through  Chinese  ignor- 
ance and  corruption.  Lorenzo,  with  the  cunning  of  a 
Machiavelli,  always  seemed  to  be  able  to  pick  the  valuable 
from  the  valueless  with  unerring  instinct — that  alone  was 
a  mighty  gift.  He  was  therefore,  from  the  moment  he 
arrived,  far  more  suited  to  this  Oriental  world  than  the  vast 
majority  of  men  who  had  lived  in  it  half  their  lives  and 
still  did  not  understand  it  in  the  least.  That  was  what 
surprised  and  delighted  Carnot — this  man  fitted  the  situa- 
tion like  a  glove.  He  was  so  easy  in  his  manner,  so  supple, 
so  adaptive;  and  possessed,  above  all,  a  talent  little  short  of 
marvellous  for  showing  by  insinuations  and  felt  touches  to 
men  of  the  most  dissimilar  colour  or  nationality  the  advan- 
tages of  anything  on  which  he  was  pleased  to  lay  insistence. 
He  was  also  very  cynical — a  turn  of  mind  which,  if  properly 
held  in  check,  is  of  much  greater  market  value  than  is  popu- 
larly supposed.  For  it  is  well  to  know  that  it  is  the  cynic 
who  generally  first  sees  the  line  of  least  resistance — the 
line  along  which,  owing  to  the  weakness  of  human  nature, 
most  things  progress — unless  exceptional  forces  come  into 
play.  A  shrewd  cynic,  should  he  possess  energy,  need 
never  remain  a  poor  man  in  the  present  era. 

Lorenzo,  however,  in  spite  of  his  great  gifts,  was  locally 
highly  unpopular,  and  most  people  in  the  dull-minded  little 
world  in  which  he  for  the  time  being  lived  found  it  easiest 
to  belittle  him  by  proclaiming  that  he  was  evidently  no 
gentleman — which  pronouncement  affected  him  as  little  as 
most  others  he  constantly  heard.  In  a  capital  beginning  to 
suffer  acutely  from  panic  owing  to  barefaced  aggression  it 
is  doubtful  how  far  a  person  desirious  of  acting  nobly  would 
have  gone — and  that  was  just  what  Lorenzo  argued.  Just 
then  common  cunning  was  much  more  useful  than  all  the 
virtues  in  the  world.  It  was  a  question  of  ready  wits  and 
nothing  else — a  state  of  affairs  Lorenzo  had  understood 
from  the  very  instant  of  his  arrival.  Whilst  it  is  not  yet 
permissible  to  say  that  a  man's  success  or  non-success  in 
life  is  the  real  measure  of  his  worth,  the  time  is  evidently 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  173 

fast  approaching  when  certain  old  standards  are  to  be  set 
aside ;  and  this  was  what  Lorenzo  also  believed. 

As  he  now  sat  there  familiarly  with  Carnot,  he  was  well 
aware  that  it  would  be  thought  intolerable  that  he  should 
condescend  to  extract  every  bit  of  gossip  and  every  scrap 
of  talk  he  could  after  this  particular  method.  Yet  it  was 
just  that  which  amused  him,  instead  of  irritating  him;  for 
Lorenzo  always  had,  quite  openly,  the  courage  of  his 
methods,  which  is  much  better,  be  it  remarked,  than  merely 
having  the  courage  of  one's  opinions.  So  now,  having  heard 
all  the  general  details  regarding  an  entertainment  to  which 
he  had  not  been  bidden,  he  amused  himself  with  his  cigar 
and  a  close  contemplation  of  his  finger-nails  pending  the 
asking  of  certain  questions  which  were  not  in  any  way 
related  to  what  the  pair  had  hitherto  talked  about.  Carnot 
had  not  yet  finished  despatching  some  business;  and  until 
he  had  finished  he  would  not  be  quite  as  communicative  as 
Lorenzo  desired.  There  is  a  science  of  knowing  when  to 
speak,  just  as  there  is  the  art  of  listening. 

"Li  Hung  Chang  was  there,"  said  Lorenzo  at  last  reflec- 
tively, esteeming  the  right  moment  had  arrived.  He  spoke 
not  as  if  he  were  stating  a  fact,  but  as  if  he  were  asking  for 
a  brief  summary  of  all  the  great  Viceroy  had  done  during 
the  whole  evening. 

Carnot  looked  up  instantly  from  his  account-books,  with 
a  grin  and  wink — and  suddenly  dropped  his  pen. 

"It  must  have  been  very  funny,"  he  said  gruffly  in  French. 
"He  was  surrounded,  covered  the  whole  time — it  was  just 
like  flies  on  a  dead  horse!  Many  were  searching  for  an 
opportunity  for  a  word  alone;  but  the  old  man  on  purpose 
shouted  his  answers  so  that  every  one  could  hear.  There 
were  several  good  contretemps!' 

"For  instance?"  Lorenzo  took  his  cigar  from  his  mouth  and 
looked  interested. 

"Have  you  not  heard  about  the  German?" 

Lorenzo  shook  his  head. 

"Well,"  said  Carnot,  "that  was  a  good  thrust.     A  Ger- 


174  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

man  came  up  and  was  presented.  'Merchant  or  missionary?' 
asked  the  old  man,  pointing  a  ringer  at  him.  'A  merchant, 
Your  Excellency/  answered  the  interpreter,  'who  is  travel- 
ling through  the  empire.'  'Good!'  said  the  Viceroy;  'if  he 
is  killed  he  can  be  settled  for  in  cash — but  the  next  mis- 
sionaries will  cost  us  a  whole  province,  I  am  much  afraid.'  " 

Lorenzo  laughed  so  heartily  that  Carnot  was  flattered  and 
went  on  talking.  There  seemed  no  end  to  his  tales.  There 
were  all  sorts  of  stories  regarding  the  methods  he  employed 
to  satisfy  his  own  insatiable  curiosity.  Yet  the  truth  was 
very  simple.  It  was  merely  by  keeping  his  ears  open  that 
he  gleaned  such  an  astonishing  lot  of  titbits  in  which  truth 
and  fiction  were  so  picturesquely  and  strangely  mixed. 

"It  was  certainly  a  great  opportunity,"  remarked  Lorenzo 
reflectively  when  Carnot  had  apparently  exhausted  his  entire 
stock  of  anecdotes.  "The  only  way  to  succeed  with  these 
people  is  to  sit  right  down  in  front  of  them  and  force 
yourself  on  them.  Then  they  just  manage  to  remember  you 
when  you  wish  them  to.  That  is  half  the  battle  here — 
perhaps  even  the  whole  battle — how  to  make  one's  self 
remembered.  Fortunately  I  am  now  past  that  stage — they 
will  not  easily  forget  me — but  for  others  it  was  undoubtedly 
a  good  opportunity." 

Lorenzo's  mind  turned  instinctively  to  the  new  matter  he 
had  in  hand,  and  as  he  thought,  he  slowly  opened  a  little 
note-book  and  began  jotting  something  down.  At  once  the 
two  clerks  in  the  corner  twisted  their  almond  eyes  round  to 
see  what  he  was  doing.  Except  for  their  eyes  they  had  not 
moved  a  muscle.  Yet  Lorenzo  noticed  their  eyes,  and  was 
a  little  irritated. 

"What  are  you  doing?"  said  Carnot,  looking  up.  Finally 
the  scribble  of  Lorenzo's  pencil  had  also  aroused  his  own 
curiosity.  The  Italian  was  now  writing  quickly  and  appar- 
ently unendingly. 

Lorenzo   finished   first   and   then   observed    Carnot   coolly 

for  a  moment.  He  also  restored  the  note-book  to  his 
pocket  before  answering,  as  if  it  were  safest  to  have  it  out  of 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  175 

sight.  The  incident  was  peculiarly  characteristic  of  the  inter- 
course between  the  two  men. 

"Mon  ami,"  he  said  in  French  in  a  new  manner,  "I  find 
you  at  times  too  curious,  but  for  once  I  will  let  you  know. 
I  noted  that  I  had  an  appointment  at  four  o'clock." 

Carnot  smiled,  and  the  two  clerks,  having  heard,  exchanged 
incredulous  looks  and  resumed  their  work.  . 

"Blagueur,"  murmured  the  Swiss  unbelievingly.  He  was 
not  at  all  annoyed  with  the  rebuff  Lorenzo  had  administered. 
Sometimes  Carnot  became  angry  because  that  was  the  easiest 
way  out  of  a  difficulty;  but  he  did  not  really  understand 
what  it  meant  to  be  annoyed. 

"I  would  like  to  know  something  more  about  that  man 
Boisragon,"  began  Lorenzo  after  a  while.  "He  is  very 
amusing  the  way  he  hides  himself,  as  well  as  his  wife — 
the  way  he  appears  only  to  disappear.  He  was  there  last 
night." 

"I  know  a  lot  about  him,"  remarked  Carnot,  not  looking 
up  from  his  books. 

"Well?"  said  Lorenzo  inquiringly. 

"I  am  sorry,  Monsieur  Lorenzo,"  replied  the  hotel-keeper 
with  mock  politeness,  "but  I  am  very  busy  just  now.  I  will 
oblige  you  later.  I  will  tell  you  at  four  o'clock."  He 
burst  out  laughing,  delighted  at  his  talent  for  repartee. 

Lorenzo  shrugged  his  shoulders. 

"That  is  so  old,"  he  said. 

"Things  that  are  new  are  not  necessarily  the  best," 
announced  Carnot,  rather  offended  that  his  wit  was  not 
applauded. 

Lorenzo  yawned  and  began  watching  the  other  corner  of 
the  room.  He  had  been  rather  clumsy  about  Boisragon, 
he  reflected ;  for  he  very  much  wanted  to  know  a  number  of 
things  about  him.  However,  he  could  wait,  so  he  would  be 
indifferent. 

The  fat  Chinaman  who  acted  as  the  hotel-runner  had  just 
come  up  and  thrust  his  head  through  a  little  trap-door 
near  the  two  clerks,  and  was  now  vainly  brandishing  a  sheet 


i;6  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

of  paper  at  them.  The  two  supercilious  young  men  treated 
these  overtures  with  studied  indifference,  and  even  pre- 
tended not  to  notice  them.  The  fat  man  several  times 
withdrew  his  head  to  address  sarcastic  comments  about  the 
appearance  of  the  clerks  to  two  or  three  others  of  his  kind 
who  were  idly  watching  the  comedy  with  their  noses  flat- 
tened against  another  little  window.  Yet  that  had  no 
effect.  So  the  fat  man  suddenly  made  up  his  mind  to  go 
further.  He  succeeded  after  an  effort  in  getting  his  whole 
head  and  shoulders  through  the  trap-door.  Then  by  stretch- 
ing out  an  arm  he  could  just  wave  his  account-paper  under 
the  noses  of  the  young  clerks.  As  they  still  pretended  to 
take  no  notice,  at  last  he  angrily  flung  it  down  right  on 
top  of  their  books.  Without  raising  their  heads,  simul- 
taneously they  flicked  it  to  the  ground.  There  was  a  titter 
from  the  onlookers  behind  the  window,  and  the  fat  man, 
having  lost  face,  exploded  into  hoarse  oaths.  Carnot 
instantly  wheeled  round  in  his  chair. 

"Allons,  allons!"  he  cried  gruffly;  "what  the  devil  are  you 
all  doing?  Is  this  a  circus?" 

Lorenzo,  stifling  his  laughter,  began  urging  the  fat  man 
to  go  on.  So  the  fat  man  explained  the  rudeness  of  the 
two  clerks.  White  with  sudden  anger  at  his  words,  they  rose 
and  tried  to  shut  the  trap-door  in  his  face. 

"I  back  the  fat  man,"  said  Lorenzo,  enjoying  it  all  hugely. 
The  fat  man  was  certainly  winning  the  day,  for  he  brought 
his  weight  into  play,  and  the  noses  against  the  other  window 
were  so  highly  interested  in  the  performance  that  they  nearly 
burst  through  the  glass. 

"We  are  insulted,"  said  the  two  clerks  in  Chinese  to 
Carnot,  finally  seeing  that  they  could  not  beat  the  fat  man 
and  preparing  to  leave  the  room. 

"Sit  down,"  roared  Carnot;    "and  you — come  here." 

The  fat  man  instantly  desisted  and  came  round  to  the 
door  and  stood  there  penitently.  The  clerks  at  once  banged 
the  trap-door  to.-  At  that  sound  the  fat  man's  good- 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  177 

humoured  face  looked  so  ridiculous  with  conflicting  emotions 
that  even  Carnot  smiled. 

"Rascal,"  he  said,  "I  will  beat  you  if  you  make  more  trouble. 
Bring  your  account  here." 

The  man  walked  across  the  room  and  picked  the  paper 
from  the  ground,  murmuring  taunts  to  the  clerks  at  the  same 
time  which  made  them  tremble. 

"In  future  give  your  accounts  to  me,"  commanded  Carnot, 
dismissing  him.  The  fat  man,  having  triumphed,  walked 
out  solemnly  and  calmly  to  the  hall,  put  on  his  battered 
Terai  hat,  and  joined  the  others  who  were  gazing  in  delight 
through  the  glass  at  the  two  beaten  clerks.  The  ring  of  faces 
said  so  much  that  the  clerks  could  scarcely  continue  working. 

Lorenzo  stood  up  and  looked  at  his  watch. 

"Boisragon,"  he  began  once  more  tentatively,  coming  back 
to  his  point. 

"Boisragon  is  a  sly  man,"  said  Carnot  facetiously,  "about 
whom  you  may  learn  everything  in  a  few  years." 

Lorenzo  shrugged  his  shoulders  and  walked  out  on  his  way 
to  the  Club.  He  was  quite  satisfied  now,  for  he  had  made 
up  his  mind  on  certain  points.  All  the  time  he  had  been 
sitting  there  he  had  been  idly  gazing  at  a  big  piece  of  paper 
which  Carnot  consulted  from  time  to  time.  Though  it  was 
upside  down  to  him  he  had  at  length  managed  to  grasp  its 
contents..  It  was  a  distribution  of  the  rooms  of  the  little 
hotel.  By  following  the  numbers  he  had  gone  over  the  list 
until  he  had  grasped  the  contents.  Against  the  rooms  occu- 
pied by  the  Boisragons  he  had  deciphered — "Fresh  instruc- 
tions; retained  indefinitely." 

That  was  certainly  interesting — highly  interesting,  and 
gave  him  a  clue.  He  thought  of  the  next  thing  he  should 
try  to  find  out.  That  would  be  harder. 

No  sooner  did  the  clerks  hear  the  hotel-doors  swing  to 
behind  him  than  they  coughed  together  several  times. 

Immediately  Carnot  looked  up  as  if  he  understood  the 
meaning  of  that. 


178  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

"What  is  it?"  he  said  gruffly  in  Chinese. 

The  two  young  men  pointed  simultaneously  with  their  pens. 

"That  paper." 

"Well?" 

"He  saw  it  all  the  time,"  said  the  two  clerks. 

"Hein!"  remarked  Carnot,  crossly  locking  it  up  in  a  drawer. 

The  two  clerks  smiled  across  to  each  other,  and  their 
spirits  began  to  rise.  The  Italian  had  been  paid  back  a 
little  for  his  partisanship  of  the  fat  man.  As  for  the  fat 
man,  they  would  try  and  give  him  later  a  really  bad  time — 
in  other  ways  familiar  to  all  Asia. 


CHAPTER  XI 

"Une  femme  qui  n'a  pas  etc  jolie  n'a  pas  etc 
jeune."— MME.   SWETCHINE. 

THE  rolling  country  around  the  vast  walled  city  had  changed 
in  a  somewhat  miraculous  manner  since  Peter  Kerr  had  first 
travelled  into  it  on  the  blazing  spring  day  of  his  arrival. 
Then  it  had  been  one  vast  monotone  of  winter  browns,  only 
relieved  here  and  there  by  the  dark  green  trees  which  sur- 
rounded the  endless  family  burying-places  of  an  ancestor- 
worshipping  country  and  by  the  few  willow  and  elm  trees 
irresolutely  distributed  in  the  neighbourhood  of  the  straggling 
and  untidy  mud  villages.  These  trees  had  indeed  been  the 
only  promising  things — otherwise  the  land  had  seemed  as 
stale  and  as  flat  and  as  unprofitable  as  poor  mother  earth 
can  possibly  be.  It  all  appeared  to  the  eye  as  a  vast  region 
taking  the  passage  of  seasons  unprofitably  in  a  state  of 
unalterable  brownness. 

The  dust-powdered  highways  on  such  days  looked  even 
grey — that  peculiar  grey  which  comes  from  old  age  and  con- 
tinual ill  treatment — and  the  toiling  teams,  slowly  trundling 
their  great  loads  over  all  difficulties  to  the  tune  of  much 
raucous  cursing  and  much  cracking  of  whips — these  luckless 
teams  seemed  bowed  down  in  the  same  despondency.  The 
vicious  dust-storms  of  early  spring,  sweeping  over  the  moun- 
tains from  far-away  Mongolia  and  the  Gobi  Desert, 
expended  their  last  efforts  in  threshing  this  hapless  country 
until  sometimes  it  turned  to  an  unbelievable  grey  from  very 
pain.  Winter  had  passed:  summer  had  not  yet  come — the 
land  was  between  the  devil  and  the  deep  blue  sea — and 
there  was  no  health  in  it.  It  seemed  impossible,  indeed, 
during  these  dust-storms,  which  only  stopped  to  begin  once 
more,  that  anything  could  really  live  and  thrive  in  such 


180  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

an  unhappy  clime.  That  the  land  should  lie  eternally  brown, 
or  grey,  seemed  only  meet  and  proper. 

Yet  when  the  wind  veered  to  the  south,  the  quarter  in 
which  it  fortunately  lay  when  the  gods  had  brought  Peter 
Kerr  to  Peking,  forthwith  the  great  big  sun,  shining  search- 
ingly  like  a  wrathful  Mormon  eye  on  all  trembling  souls, 
'  would  jump  the  mercury  of  the  thermometer  from  the 
forties  and  fifties  to  the  eighties  and  nineties,  making  the 
early  spring  seem  almost  summer.  The  brownness  of  the 
soil  would  still  remain  for  a  few  days — but  only  for  a  few 
days,  a  very  few  days.  Then  the  miracle  of  spring  would 
come.  It  was  delicious;  it  was  wonderful;  it  was  unbe- 
lievable. Nature,  perhaps  ashamed  of  her  rude  and  uncouth 
aspect  with  the  marriage  month  of  May  so  very  near,  decided 
in  the  night  to  garb  herself  properly,  and,  he  presto,  the  land 
would  be  green — a  sort  of  nile-green,  seeming  many  shades 
different  from  all  the  other  greens  in  the  world  because  of 
the  grey-brown  soil  and  the  copper  sun,  and  the  memory  of 
the  abomination  of  desolation  which  had  so  long  endured. 

Accompanying  this  there  would  be  another  miracle.  Not 
only  did  the  barrenness  depart,  but  everything  became  dif- 
ferent, quite  different.  The  distances  were  different,  the 
contours  of  the  earth  were  different,  the  roads  were  differ- 
ent— yes,  the  very  villages  and  the  people  became  different — 
all  the  throbbing,  living,  moving,  shouting,  laughing,  curs- 
ing world  was  changed.  Mere  ugly  outlines  seemed  sud- 
denly softened  and  changed,  as  if  some  subtle  influence,  steal- 
ing gently  everywhere,  banished  all  memory  of  the  iron 
winter  and  the  angry  spring — and  the  nearness  of  the  great 
deserts  beyond  the  monstrous  boundary  wall  of  China — and 
all  the  other  rude  and  horrid  things  suggestive  of  a  barbarous 
land.  Everything  must  be  forgotten — everything,  for  the 
marriage  month  of  May  was  very  near.  Nature  called  with 
her  insistent  voice;  Nature  bade  men  and  things  forget  all 
save  that  fleeting  time  could  not  stand  still,  and  that  this 
rare  season  of  greenness  must  be  speedily  taken  advantage  of. 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  181 

And  that  is  just  why  the  winter  and  summer  in  this  land 
were  as  unlike  as  Moor  and  Greek. 

Madame  Boisragon  had  ridden  into  this  blooming  country 
very  early  in  the  morning,  accompanied  only  by  her  mafu, 
or  Chinese  groom.  Both  were  mounted  on  the  stumpy  but 
powerful  China  pony,  which  is  not  really  a  product  of 
China  at  all,  but  of  Mongolia.  These  little  beasts,  which 
at  first  sight  appear  ridiculous  to  those  accustomed  only  to 
slim  and  dainty-footed  thoroughbreds,  are  brought  down 
yearly  in  thousands  through  the  great  mountain  passes  from 
the  grasslands  beyond  the  Great  Wall  and  are  speedily 
impressed  into  all  kinds  of  service.  They  are  raced;  they 
pull  carts  and  carriages;  they  carry  packs;  they  become 
veritable  beasts-of-all-work,  capable  of  resisting  fatigue  in  a 
remarkable  manner.  The  freezing  cold  and  the  sweating 
summer  seem  to  mean  but  little  to  them.  Always  willing, 
they  will  go,  like  the  best  blooded  stock,  to  the  last  gasp. 
Generally  ill-cared  for,  and  poorly  fed  on  a  rough  diet  of 
chopped  straw  and  kaoliang  grain,  they  have  a  singularly 
unprepossessing  appearance.  Yet  a  few  weeks  of  good  treat- 
ment and  good  food  will  change  an  uncouth  woolly-coated 
beast  into  a  very  tolerable  imitation  of  a  light  cob. 

The  pretty  black  gelding  ridden  by  Madame  Boisragon 
had  been  brought  to  such  a  fine  condition  that  the  toss  of 
his  head  and  his  springy  action  made  him  almost  an  Arab 
in  looks.  He  had  just  been  galloped  hard  along  the  great 
sandy  stretches  under  the  Tartar  city  wall;  and  now, 
breathless  and  trembling  with  excitement,  he  danced  as  if 
his  feet  were  on  springs  through  the  little  flanking  city  gate 
leading  into  the  open  country.  The  ancient  stoneway,  broken 
and  full  of  dangerous  holes,  rang  with  the  quick  stamp  of 
his  iron,  and  for  a  few  moments  Madame  Boisragon  trembled 
for  her  safety.  Yet  she  soon  forgot  that  in  the  scene  without. 
It  was  a  feast  of  the  senses  to  drink  in  the  wonderful  colour- 
ing which  the  rising  sun  was  now  flinging  over  the  country. 


1 8*  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

In  the  nut-dry  atmosphere  every  detail  stood  out  as  clear-cut 
as  a  cameo — as  if  light  and  shade  had  been  carved  from  solid 
things. 

Immediately  behind  her  the  wonderful,  crenellated  city 
walls  now  stretched  away  in  stiff  ruler-like  lines,  crowned  at 
regular  intervals  with  the  imposing  square  towers  of  painted 
timber  and  brick  which  give  a  curious  symmetry  and  dis- 
tinction to  what  would  otherwise  appear  like  some  giant 
geometrical  diagram  set  in  relief  on  a  sandy  plain.  Against 
the  yellow-brown  stretches  of  sand,  banked  up  very  high 
by  the  winds  of  ages,  the  Tartar  walls  now  looked  blue- 
grey.  There  was  something  singularly  pure  and  impressive 
in  their  calm  dignity.  The  nearer  towers,  though  the  barbaric 
reds  and  greens  which  stained  their  mighty  rafters  were  lost 
in  the  distance,  threw  off  glints  of  gold  from  their  tarnished 
gilding  and  sudden  flashes  from  their  copperwork  as  the  sun 
swung  ever  upwards.  Beyond  the  sand-banks  ran  broad  and 
muddy  canals  forming  parallel  lines  to  the  city  walls,  and 
indeed  designed  to  lend  the  walls  greater  strength  by  being 
thus  interposed  between  them  and  all  possible  enemies.  In 
mediaeval  times,  to  bridge  those  broad  canals  under  a  fierce 
fire  from  bowmen  and  matchlockmen  posted  above  was  in 
itself  a  great  business:  to  storm  the  walls  themselves  was 
well-nigh  impossible.  No  wonder  that  this  great  capital 
had  only  succumbed  to  the  Manchu  conquerors  after  the 
employment  of  treachery! 

Outside  the  great  walls  and  the  sandy  stretches  and  the 
encircling  canals  were  many1  low-lying  houses  standing 
together  in  irregular  masses  which  yet  seemed  to  possess, 
despite  their  dilapidation  and  confusion,  a  last  remnant  of 
the  stiff  camplike  lines  which  had  once  distinguished  every 
inch  of  the  Tartar  capital.  It  was  a  permanent  encampment 
in  brick  and  stone,  both  within  and  without  the  great 
walls — an  encampment  so  great  that  it  had  overflowed  into 
the  country.  Here,  in  those  days  of  a  decade  or  so  ago, 
under  the  Tartar  walls  there  was  still  much  practising  with 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  183 

the  twanging  Manchu  longbow,  proficiency  in  which  entitled 
the  privileged  Manchu  clansmen  to  become  Palace  guards, 
protecting  the  entrances  to  the  Forbidden  City  night  and  day. 
These  longbows,  sending  arrows  home  true  and  hard  into 
little  red  and  white  targets,  still  seemed  to  their  owners  to 
possess  virtues  which  had  really  long  disappeared.  They 
might  even  help  to  remove  the  foreign  menace — who  knew! 
The  archers,  stripped  to  the  waist  and  working  together  in 
groups,  had  even  that  morning  followed  the  two  galloping 
ponies  with  taunts  and  shouts,  as  if  the  sight  of  a  white 
woman  had  at  once  brought  to  their  minds  a  vivid  recollec- 
tion of  the  wrongs  now  inflicted  on  the  dynasty.  It  was 
almost  a  wonder  that  such  shouts  were  not  backed  up  with 
arrows. 

Yet  once  these  scenes  were  left  behind,  one  came  as  if  by 
magic  into  a  world  utterly  unrelated  to  the  strange  mediaeval 
city  of  the  Tartars.  It  was  a  world  common  to  all  peoples, 
be  they  brown  or  yellow  or  white,  the  world  of  tillers  of  the 
soil,  earning  by  the  sweat  of  their  brows  a  bare  livelihood, 
and  having  scant  time  to  trouble  about  anything  else.  The 
country  beyond  the  city  walls  served  to  make  clear  to  the 
observant  eye  all  Chinese  history.  The  people  of  the  land, 
the  real  Chinese,  were  peaceful  cultivators  who  in  their  dis- 
tant golden  ages  of  art  and  culture  had  attained  the  zenith 
of  their  happiness.  Always  menaced  by  the  warlike  and 
uncouth  peoples  of  the  deserts  and  rolling  steppes  of  the 
north — the  lands  beyond  the  mountain  passes — after  con- 
stant, struggles  to  retain  their  self-sufficient  happiness,  they 
had  at  last  succumbed  so  often  to  the  enemy  that  conquest 
had  seemed  their  natural  lot  and  they  ceased  to  care.  It  is 
true  that  these  hordes,  after  the  actual  shock  of  battle  had 
been  forgotten,  because  of  their  consanguinity  had  always 
been  content  to  leave  the  common  people  much  as  they  were 
before,  only  retaining  in  their  hands  the  essential  outer 
symbols  of  Imperial  Power — such  as  the  Dragon  Throne, 
the  worship  of  Heaven  at  the  appointed  altars,  the  posses- 


1 84  THE   HUMAN  COBWEB 

sion  of  the  mighty  entrenched  capital,  designed  by  Tartars 
of  many  centuries  ago,  the  manning  of  a  dozen  strategic 
strong  places  which  dominated  the  provinces. 

Yet  though  only  these  things  were  usurped,  in  themselves 
they  were  amply  sufficient  to  destroy  the  old  ideal  Chinese 
state.  It  was  without  doubt  such  usurpation  which  had 
introduced  the  canker  which  caused  the  old  stone  bridges, 
the  temples,  the  canals,  the  countless  monuments  of  the 
real  Chinese  times,  to  fall  into  ruins.  It  was  the  capital  and 
the  Dragon  Throne  which  alone  counted  after  each  con- 
quest— the  steel  head  fitted  to  the  pliant  wooden  shaft 
needed  alone  be  kept  bright.  Yet  the  brightness  of  the  steel 
head,  in  such  an  enervating  environment,  inevitably  itself 
became  illusive — the  conquerors,  without  knowing  it,  were 
conquered  by  the  sloth  around  them.  And  therefore  when 
the  final  blow  to  China  had  come — the  blow  dealt  by  the 
white  man,  simply  because  he  had  come  to  this  land  in  his 
thousands  and  had  demonstrated  by  the  arts  of  peace  just 
as  much  as  by  the  arts  of  war  that  the  world  can  never 
stand  still — nothing  more  was  needed  to  complete  the  illus- 
tration of  unalterable  laws.  A  land  enslaved  by  a  process 
of  sterilization,  coming  as  the  aftermath  of  conquest,  is  a 
land  lost  in  the  modern  struggle.  That  was  as  clear  as  the 
cameolike  aspect  of  the  savage  old  capital  itself. 

To  Madame  Boisragon,  the  immense  walled  city,  now  that 
it  was  receding  into  the  middle  distance — with  a  broad  belt 
of  green  kitchen  gardens  in  the  immediate  foreground,  and 
the  blue-black  tracing  of  the  Mongolian  mountains  in  the 
distant  background — seemed  more  wonderful  than  ever.  Its 
frowning  battlements  appeared  as  unreal  as  pictures  of 
mediaeval  Europe  probably  do  to  the  sceptical  eyes  of  the 
modern  child.  It  was  part  of  fairyland.  To  think  that  in 
the  centre  of  this  city  was  another  Forbidden  City,  full  of 
an  imprisoned  humanity  made  up  of  concubines,  female 
slaves,  eunuchs,  and  all  the  other  necessary  Eastern  adjuncts 
to  Imperial  Power — a  Forbidden  City  which  was  the  out- 
ward and  visible  sign  of  the  mastery  of  a  mere  handful  of  men 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  185 

over  four  hundred  million  souls — was  a  little  wonderful,  cer- 
tainly. It  was  a  greater  miracle  than  the  Mogul  power  in 
India  had  been;  and  yet,  at  the  same  time,  by  reason  of  the 
peaceful  nature  of  the  toiling  millions,  it  was  no  miracle 
at  all.  Subtract  the  European — the  foreigner — take  him 
away,  and  things  would  be  as  they  had  been  before.  There 
would  be  no  difficulty  in  governing  at  all.  The  European 
had  played  the  part  of  the  sharp-eyed  child  in  a  book  of 
Eastern  tales,  the  child  who,  when  all  the  obsequious  popu- 
lation of  a  capital  was  exclaiming  at  the  matchless  silks 
clothing  their  vain  king  as  he  paraded  the  streets — the  silks 
which  were  so  finely  woven  that  they  existed  only  in  his 
imagination — called  out,  "But  he  is  naked — he  is  not  clothed 
at  all !"  In  the  fairy-tale,  of  course,  the  child  was  rewarded 
and  the  dishonest  merchant  who  had  defeated  all  com- 
petitors by  trading  on  the  king's  vanity  was  beheaded ;  but 
unfortunately  China  was  no  fairy-tale,  and  the  Manchus, 
having  lived  by  deception,  were  filled  only  with  hatred  by 
the  exposure  which  had  been  brought  about. 

And  no  wonder!  All  was  so  well  arranged  for  them,  in 
spite  of  the  great  decay  which  had  set  in.  They  possessed  the 
great  capital  of  Kublai  Khan.  There  were  beautiful 
temples,  set  like  dusty  jewels  around  the  city  for  the  Imperial 
worship — temples  of  Heaven,  of  the  Earth,  of  the  Sun,  of 
the  Moon.  Vast  Imperial  granaries  stood  under  the  shadow 
of  the  Tartar  walls  stored  with  tribute-food  brought  by 
canal  right  up  from  the  great  Yang-tse  rice-fields  to  feed 
the  multitude  of  the  conqueror's  adherents.  Silk  garments 
arrived  from  the  Imperial  looms  in  the  south  to  clothe  them 
all.  The  royal  sable  chase,  conducted  by  semi-savage  hunts- 
men on  the  northern  outskirts  of  the  empire,  gave  them  the 
finest  winter  clothing.  In  their  walled  hunting-parks,  they 
could  hunt,  if  they  wished,  all  manner  of  wild  beasts. 
Among  the  foot-hills  fringing  the  rude  mountain  passes 
leading  to  Mongolia  were  summer  pleasaunces  with  artificial 
lakes  and  marble  walks  and  jade  fountains  and  delightful 
groves  which  enabled  the  sovereigns  to  forget  that  the  most 


1 86  THE   HUMAN    COBWEB 

famous  Summer  Palace  in  the  world  had  once  been  given  up 
to  fire  and  rapine  at  the  hands  of  European  soldiery. 
Imperial  porcelain  factories  made  the  most  beautiful  porce- 
lain; Imperial  farms  produced  precious  ginseng  to  cure  all 
sicknesses;  Imperial  breeding-grounds  filled  the  Imperial 
studs, — there  was  everything  that  mortals  could  desire.  For 
two  hundred  and  fifty  years  the  fairy  godmother  had  poured 
everything  into  the  laps  of  the  Manchus  they  could  desire; 
whilst  the  people,  the  four  hundred  millions,  had  toiled  con- 
tentedly as  before,  each  one  contributing  his  little  quota 
towards  the  support  of  this  tiny  dominant  race  which  dwelt 
in  Peking.  It  was  wonderful. 

Madame  Boisragon  was  thinking  of  these  things  as  she 
now  rode  slowly  along.  It  was  in  the  air — she  could  not 
have  helped  it.  A  little  group  of  half-naked  children,  instead 
of  running  after  her  and  begging  money,  drew  suddenly  aside 
with  threatening  gestures  as  they  saw  what  she  was.  That 
had  been  taught  them  by  their  elders;  it  was  quite  a  new 
thing  and  rather  frightened  her. 

Madame  Boisragon  now  quickly  cantered  along  to  a 
mound  which  made  a  great  landmark  to  any  one  coming 
along  these  roads.  There  she  felt  sure  she  would  not  be 
hard  to  find,  and  just  then  she  had  no  wish  to  remain  alone. 
She  dismounted  and  climbed  to  the  top. 

Peter  Kerr  had  left  the  little  hotel  much  before  Madame 
Boisragon,  for  he  was  an  early  riser;  but  he  had  taken  a 
different  road,  and  had  purposely  lingered  on  his  way.  A 
great  market-street,  full  of  early  morning  bustle,  had  caught 
his  attention  and  held  him  enchained.  He  had  never  before 
been  in  the  dealers'  quarters  of  the  city,  where  the  wholesale 
merchants  receive  and  despatch  their  land-borne  freight. 
The  whole  process  of  exchange  was  now  going  rapidly  on 
in  the  simplest  forms  at  this  early  hour,  and  made  a  marvel- 
lous scene. 

Down  the  great  street  where  he  found  himself,  the  special 
products  of  a  dozen  provinces  were  being  unladen  from  carts 


THE   HUMAN  COBWEB  187 

which  were  backed  right  into  the  warehouses,  whilst  the 
unyoked  teams  lay  exhausted  on  the  ground  or  munched  the 
remains  of  millet  and  straw  in  their  clumsy  osier  feed- 
baskets.  More  carts  were  arriving  all  the  time  in  long 
strings.  The  drivers,  powdered  in  fine  grey  dust  from  head 
to  foot,  with  streaks  of  sweat  making  watercourses  down 
their  bronzed  faces,  cracked  their  whips  and  shouted  lustily 
as  they  arrived.  Though  it  was  not  yet  seven  in  the  morn- 
ing they  had  already  done  almost  a  half-day  stage;  for  they 
had  started  perhaps  at  midnight,  so  as  to  arrive  as  near 
dawn  as  possible.  Their  knowing  teams  broke  into  an 
ambling  trot  as  they  scented  the  end  of  their  labours ;  whilst 
the  godown-keepers  and  their  apprentices,  who  were  stand- 
ing at  every  entrance,  awaited  the  unlading  with  weighing- 
rods  and  measuring-sticks  in  hand.  This  was  a  world  of 
heavy  bales,  and  sweating  animals,  and  blue-clad  men  half- 
stripped  for  the  fray;  a  world  invading  every  foot  of  the 
great  open  thoroughfare  in  utter  contempt  for  the  public 
weal ;  a  world  only  interested  in  its  special  business  of  receiv- 
ing and  despatching  goods  and  ready  to  fight  away  all 
intruders. 

For  the  business  never  ended.  After  goods  had  been 
received,  they  had  to  be  re-packed  and  re-weighed  and  re- 
labelled and  re-marked.  For  this  street  was  the  warehouse 
for  all  those  peoples  of  the  grassy  plains  and  sandy  steppes 
who  depend  on  the  toiling  millions  of  China  for  their  tea, 
their  paper,  their  tobacco,  their  every  luxury.  So  in  exchange 
for  the  skins  and  furs  and  hides  which  they  send  down  by  the 
million,  they  receive  back  these  things.  And  it  was  in  this, 
very  street  that  all  this  exchange  and  barter  was  duly 
arranged  for. 

And  since  no  wheels  could  run  with  profit  up  into  such 
rough  mountain  country,  pack-animals  must  go  there.  The 
snarling  camel,  the  sure-footed  mule,  the  willing  donkey, 
each  was  despatched  from  here  carrying  its  special  kind  of 
load.  Endless  chains  of  such  animals  were  always  travelling 
up  and  down  the  passes — chains  which  wound  in  and  out  of 


1 88  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

this  street,  and  finally  back  again.  Summer  and  winter  alike, 
the  trade  went  on ;  it  never  stopped.  Only  the  camels,  when 
the  copper  sun  glared  too  furiously,  were  rested  in  moun- 
tain corrals  for  a  month  or  two,  where  they  shed  their  thick 
fur  and  became  bald  and  hideous  as  nightmares;  but  no 
sooner  did  autumn  bring  their  new  coat  of  fur  than  they 
started  again,  padding  slowly  away  until  they  became  lost 
in  the  immensity  of  Central  Asia.  As  for  the  mules  and 
donkeys,  nothing  ever  stopped  them  save  death,  and  death  is 
very  long  delayed  in  China  for  everything  that  works. 

All  was  gaiety  at  that  early  hour.  Musical  mountain-bells 
were  tinkling,  as  strings  and  strings  of  these  pack-animals 
started  on  their  long  journey  or  trotted  in  home.  Their 
drivers  followed  them  calling  "left"  or  "right"  in  mono- 
syllabic animal-like  cries,  the  mules  and  donkeys  understand- 
ing and  responding  as  if  they  were  automatons.  On  the 
ground,  kneeling  together  in  serried  company,  were  packs 
of  camels,  screaming  and  grunting  whenever  the  warehouse- 
men and  drivers  loaded  them  up,  but  otherwise  contem- 
plating in  majestic  disdain  the  bustling  world  around  them, 
whilst  their  jaws  moved  in  an  unending  chewing.  The 
camels  were  more  wonderfully  human  than  even  the  other 
animals — no  liberties  could  be  taken  with  them.  A  pound 
or  two  more  than  their  correct  load  of  one  hundred  and 
twenty  catties  would  set  them  screaming  on  the  ground  long 
before  any  tugging  at  their  nose-rings  had  jerked  their  hind- 
quarters up  and  made  them  gingerly  raise  themselves  on 
their  forelegs.  They  knew,  did  these  clever  camels,  that  a 
pound  or  two  more  might  make  all  the  difference  to  their 
gimcrack  fetlocks  down  steep  mountain  inclines — for  a 
camel's  fetlock  may  be  broken  as  easily  as  an  egg  is  cracked. 
Therefore  they  always  screamed  and  grunted  discordantly 
on  the  ground  before  rising  as  a  warning,  whilst  the  lousy 
warehousemen  grinned  and  consigned  their  ancestors  and 
their  ancestors'  ancestors  to  eternal  perdition  because  no 
trickery  availed  with  such  sapient  beasts. 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  189 

The  bustle  did  not  end  with  this  great  market-street.  For 
leading  off  it  were  countless  lanes  almost  blocked  up  with 
the  goods  being  temporarily  deposited  in  them.  Every 
imaginable  thing  seemed  there  in  wholesale  lots,  thrown 
together  in  an  apparently  inextricable  confusion  which  yet 
possessed  a  certain  method  and  arrangement.  There  were 
masses  of  squealing  black  pigs  lying  on  their  backs,  their 
legs  cruelly  tied  with  straw  rope,  lying  perhaps  just  under 
the  lea  of  immense  stacks  of  green  bamboos  from  the  south. 
There  was  coarse  pottery — so  coarse  that  it  made  no  matter 
if  any  was  broken  in  the  unlading  or  not — piled  up  in 
pagodas  and  pyramids;  and  side  by  side  with  this  pottery 
might  be  the  last  thing  in  the  world  which  should  be  placed 
in  such  company — a  great  consignment  of  dried  pork  stacked 
on  straw  mats,  or  a  load  of  empty  wooden  coffins  arriving 
from  a  country  district.  Pedlars,  with  a  crazy  bit  of  patch- 
work awning  skewed  on  a  framework  of  sticks  and  so 
slanted  as  to  ward  off  the  rays  of  the  uprising  sun,  shouted 
their  loudest  to  entice  this  market  world  to  try  the  contents 
of  their  reeking  pots  and  pans.  For  they  were  cooks  and 
pastrymen  and  pedlars  all  rolled  into  one.  Other  men 
boldly  drove  miscellaneous  collections  of  pigs  and  goats  and 
sheep  into  the  press  on  their  way  to  the  butchers.  It  was 
difficult  to  understand  at  first  how  this  multifarious  life 
could  go  on  day  after  day  without  in  the  end  becoming  hope- 
lessly entangled,  hopelessly  confused.  Yet  out  of  the  con- 
fusion always  arose  a  certain  order.  Things  finally  sorted 
themselves;  for  people  knew  exactly  what  they  were  doing 
and  why  they  were  doing  it.  There  was  noise  and  piling 
together,  because  of  the  inherent  collectivism  or  communism 
which  belongs  to  the  East — but  that  did  not  mean  real 
confusion. 

Peter  Kerr,  drawn  to  a  close  inspection  of  these  multitudes 
since  he  could  only  proceed  through  them  at  a  walk,  found 
himself  unconsciously  more  and  more  interested  in  the 
theatre-like  qualities  which  surrounded  him.  He  began  tp 
stop  more  and  more  frequently.  Here  indeed  was  a  stage 


190  THE    HUMAN    COBWEB 

with  people  shouting  and  disputing;  with  people  laughing 
and  weeping;  with  people  every  imaginable  thing,  as  if  it 
were  the  common  lot  to  come  out  on  to  the  highways  and 
byways  and  present  all  moods  openly  to  the  world. 

And  you  could  see,  too,  the  great  law  of  compensation 
everywhere  working  crudely  but  successfully.  Men  swung 
back  to  their  proper  level  from  the  pressure  and  correcting 
influence  of  their  fellows.  If  a  man  lost  his  temper  and 
became  violent,  an  inevitable  adjustment  took  place — an 
adjustment  which  the  violent  man  perforce  must  sooner  or 
later  accept  with  good  grace.  If  a  man  laughed  too  much, 
the  secret  of  his  laughter  was  stolen  from  him  and  he  was 
left  that  much  the  poorer.  Where  else  save  in  an  Asiatic 
world  could  story-tellers  begin  their  business  at  quarter  to 
seven  in  the  morning,  and  soon  be  surrounded  by  a  crowd 
of  appreciative  listeners?  Yet  here  they  were  in  their  dozens. 
It  was  something  to  be  the  funny  man,  who  twisted  his  face 
into  marvellous  contortions  and  imitated  all  the  animals 
around  him,  when  the  glint  of  the  rising  sun  was  only 
beginning  to  gild  the  roof-tops.  That  required  a  good 
digestion  and  a  good  conscience  to  do;  for  humour  is  best 
when  the  sun  is  down  and  the  work  of  the  day  over.  These 
things  caused  Peter  Kerr  to  dally  greatly ;  and  only  when  he 
was  beyond  the  city  and  in  the  open  country  did  he  com- 
mence his  ride  in  earnest. 

Madame  Boisragon  had  chosen  her  coign  of  vantage  well. 
Seated  on  the  edge  of  the  old  Chinese  mound,  her  blue  skirt 
and  blue  veil  were  as  plain  to  the  eye  of  any  one  coming  along 
these  country  roads  as  if  they  had  been  signal-flags.  Peter 
Kerr  caught  sight  of  her  when  he  was  a  long  way  off  and 
came  up  at  a  gallop. 

"Good-morning,"  he  cried  as  he  swung  himself  to  the 
ground. 

"Good-morning,"  she  replied.     "How  did  you  get  here?" 

He  had  come  to  her  by  a  flanking  road  instead  of  by  the 


THE  HUMAN   COBWEB  191 

great  main  road  down  which  she  had  been  gazing,  and  his 
sudden  appearance  had  taken  her  by  surprise. 

"I  lost  myself,"  he  answered,  taking  off  his  sun-helmet 
and  wiping  his  forehead  before  clambering  up.  "That  is, 
I  became  lost  in  a  marvellous  street  where  all  the  world  was 
buying  and  selling  and  loading  and  unloading — a  regular 
caravan  street.  I  could  not  help  stopping."  He  described 
some"  of  the  things  that  had  stopped  him.  "Have  you  ever 
seen  those  long  brass  trumpets  of  the  knife-grinders?"  he 
inquired.  "There  were  three  of  those  men  together  under 
the  City  Gates,  and  just  as  I  passed  they  turned  their  trum- 
pets up  and  blew  a  sharp  chorus.  I  fully  expected  the  walls 
to  fall  like  the  walls  of  Jericho!" 

Madame  Boisragon  watched  his  face  as  he  talked.  He  was 
oddly  conscious  of  her  looks;  for  she  had  a  peculiar  way  of 
fixing  her  eyes  and  never  moving  them — until  she  felt  that 
she  herself  was  being  observed,  when  she  immediately  dropped 
them  and  turned  with  an  impatient  movement. 

"How  curious!"  she  reflected  aloud  when  he  had  finished, 
now  gazing  at  a  long  line  of  carts  coming  down  the  high- 
road. "We  have  both  been  interesting  ourselves  in  much 
the  same  subject.  I  myself  was  thinking  about  this  old  city 
all  the  way  here;  but  whilst  you  were  absorbed  in  the 
commercial  features,  picturing  Peking  as  a  sort  of  huge  car- 
avanserai, I  was  taken  with  the  idea  that  it  was  only  an 
encampment  of  people  who  have  enormously  degenerated  by 
their  confinement  within  its  massive  walls.  I  wonder  which 
of  us  is  right?" 

She  told  him  about  the  archers  she  had  seen  under  the 
wall  and  how  they  had  insolently  shouted  after  her.  Her 
pale  face,  shaded  by  a  broad-brimmed  Terai  hat  round 
which  was  pinned  her  big  blue  veil,  somehow  made  an  odd 
contrast  to  her  subject.  She  seemed  to  bear  no  relation  to 
this  alien  world — to  be  incapable  of  really  understanding  it — 
to  be  afraid  of  it. 

"Perhaps,"  Kerr  replied  presently,  when  she  had  finished, 


i92  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

"we  are  both  of  us  right  in  our  views.  The  problem  is 
merely  to  adjust  them  properly.  Do  you  remember  the 
two  rival  correspondents  in  Jules  Verne's  'Michael  StrogoiF? 
The  English  correspondent  looks  out  of  the  window  on 
one  side  of  a  railway-carriage  and  sees  mountainous  country ; 
he  enters  promptly  in  his  note-book,  'Country  very  moun- 
tainous.' The  Frenchman,  of  course,  looks  out  of  the  oppo- 
site window  and  sees  nothing  but  rolling  plains.  'Country 
flat  and  monotonous,'  he  writes  down.  That  applies  to 
all  of  us,  doesn't  it?" 

Madame  Boisragon  smiled  a  little  vaguely. 

"I  don't  believe  they  could  have  been  very  intelligent  cor- 
respondents," she  said  in  a  listless  way,  "otherwise  they 
would  not  have  been  so  stupid  as  to  look  out  of  one  window 
only." 

"But,"  argued  Peter  Kerr,  merely  for  the  sake  of  argu- 
ment, "it  is  exactly  what  we  have  just  been  doing.  People 
are  always  looking  out  of  their  own  little  windows,  and  not 
troubling  about  any  others.  Perhaps  Jules  Verne  meant 
that  as  the  text  for  a  sermon." 

Madame  Boisragon  scrutinized  him  in  a  manner  which 
seemed  to  suggest  that  he  had  been  too  subtle.  Kerr  felt 
suddenly  disappointed  with  her — perhaps  she  was  really 
stupid. 

"How  curious  you  English  are,"  she  remarked.  "You  are 
not  afraid  to  start  a  serious  discussion  at  seven  in  the  morn- 
ing— even  with  a  woman!" 

Kerr  laughed  a  little  perfunctorily. 

"I  confess  it  is  pretty  bad — for  seven  in  the  morning,"  he 
rejoined.  "Stjll,  I  promise  not  to  do  it  any  more,  if  that 
gives  you  any  comfort.  From  now  on  I  shall  agree  abso- 
lutely with  all  you  say." 

Madame  Boisragon  was  thoughtfully  picking  a  blade  of 
grass  to  pieces  when  she  next  spoke. 

"That  is  very  rash  of  you:  I  may  give  you  cause  to  repent," 
she  said  slowly. 

"Nobody  should  ever  repent,"  said   Kerr,  as  if  he  were 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  193 

stating  an  important  truth.  "It  is  a  sign  of  weakness — in 
grown-up  people,  at  least." 

"Of  weakness?"  There  was  a  sudden  curiosity  in  her 
voice.  "How  can  you  say  that?" 

"It  is  very  simple,"  he  replied  smilingly,  having  from  the 
first  made  up  his  mind  what  it  was  to  lead  up  to.  "If  one 
wants  to  do  a  thing  badly  enough,  one  does  it  deliberately. 
That  is  the  first  part,  is  it  not?  Then  after  a  time  one's 
conscience  pricks  one  and  one  becomes  repentant.  That  is 
the  second  part.  And  why  is  this  so?  Because  fear  has 
taken  the  place  of  desire,  and  in  order  to  escape,  if  possible, 
the  consequences  of  one's  deliberate  acts,  one  becomes  repent- 
ant. Therefore  to  be  repentant  is  a  sign  of  weakness.  Do 
you  see  what  I  mean?  For  instance,  if  I  made  love  to  you, 
no  matter  what  the  consequences  of  that  rash  act  might  be, 
I  should  never  repent  it!"  He  tried  to  catch  her  eyes, 
but  as  he  looked  she  turned  away. 

"That  is  also  stupid,"  she  answered,  slowly  beginning  to 
tear  another  blade  of  grass  to  pieces,  "for  seven  in  the 
morning." 

"Perhaps,"  murmured  Peter  Kerr,  taking  off  his  sun-helmet 
and  staring  at  the  little  group  of  ponies  busily  engaged  in 
cropping  the  scanty  grass  some  distance  away  from  them.  In 
a  puddle  quite  close  to  them,  a  magpie,  deluded  into  a  sense 
of  complete  security  by  the  quiet  which  reigned,  was  taking 
a  bath  with  a  great  fuss  and  fluttering  of  wings.  The 
morning  was  wonderfully  peaceful,  and  Kerr  breathed  in 
the  fresh,  crisp  air  with  sudden  enjoyment.  It  seemed 
good  to  live. 

"You  have  become  very  silent,"  said  Madame  Boisragon 
at  last,  looking  at  him  with  a  faint  smile  playing  round  the 
corners  of  her  mouth. 

"You  have  made  me  cautious,"  he  replied  at  pnce,  as  if  he 
had  been  waiting  for  that.  "I  am  afraid  now  not  only  of  a 
discussion  but  of  a  fight  as  well." 

"Do  I  look  so  very  combative,  then?" 

Peter  Kerr  turned  his  head  slowly  and  studied  her  carefully. 


194  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

"No,"  he  said  at  last  with  decision.  "You  don't  at  all — no, 

on   the  contrary,   you  look "    He   stopped   on   purpose. 

There  was  danger  in  his  eyes,  though  his  lips  smiled. 

"I  cannot  possibly  tell  what  I  look  like  to  you,"  sug- 
gested Madame  Boisragon  incautiously. 

"That  means  that  I  will  have  to  say  it,"  he  laughed. 
"Well,  I  will  tell  you  what  I  think.  If  you  were  dressed 
for  it  you  would  make  a  model  nun — with  your  eyes  cast 
down  and  humility  on  your  lips.  You  have  the  features — 
the  look — and  you  have  almost  the  habit,  one  might  say " 

She  stopped  him  with  a  sudden  flick  of  her  riding-whip; 
but  the  colour  had  for  some  reason  crept  into  her  cheeks, 
and  once  again  he  was  convinced  that  she  was  pretty. 

"How  can  you  talk  such  nonsense?"  she  exclaimed  ener- 
getically, as  if  she  disliked  the  comparison.  "I  assure  you 
I  would  make  a  very  poor  nun  indeed." 

Kerr  shook  his  head  incredulously. 

"A  nun  is  always  a  dangerous  character — when  she  is  out 
of  her  convent,"  he  continued  facetiously,  persisting  in  his 
attitude.  "You  had  best  beware." 

With  an  impatient  little  gesture,  as  if  she  were  annoyed, 
Madame  Boisragon  suddenly  stood  up  and  began  to  tie 
down  her  veil  as  a  protection  against  the  dust. 

"How  stupid  we  are,"  she  said  abruptly.  "We  are  allow- 
ing the  fresh  morning  to  slip  away  whilst  we  sit  here  talking 
absurdities.  It  is  a  great  mistake,  believe  me.  Let  us  ride." 

She  moved  off  towards  the  ponies,  calling  to  the  men  to 
make  ready.  Peter  Kerr  followed  slowly,  whistling  softly 
to  himself  and  cutting  at  some  reeds  with  his  whip.  He 
could  not  make  up  his  mind  entirely  whether  he  liked  her 
or  not.  There  was  something  which  he  could  not  explain — 
something  which  aroused  his  opposition.  He  wondered  what 
it  was  in  her  that  baffled  him.  Each  time  he  had  seen  her 
it  had  appeared;  and  to-day,  for  some  reason,  it  was  there 
stronger  than  ever. 


CHAPTER  XII 

"A  1'oeuvre  on  connait  1'artisan." — LA  FONTAINE. 

PETER  KERR  soon  had  an  opportunity  to  see  that  Lorenzo 
was  really  a  remarkable  man  in  his  own  peculiar  way.  He 
believed  he  had  done  well  to  enlist  his  services.  Lorenzo 
indeed  was  one  of  those  who  fully  grasped  what  so  few 
people  in  the  world  really  understand:  that  in  affairs  of 
importance  the  essence  matters  and  the  forms  do  not  count 
at  all.  This  is  the  very  soul  of  sound  strategy — strategy 
being  merely  the  right  line  of  advance.  Yet  convention  has 
eaten  so  deep  into  the  soul  of  man  that  generally  he  now 
sees  salvation  only  in  officialdom  and  printed  forms — that  is, 
in  the  reputed  help  of  others — and  begins  to  disbelieve  in 
his  own  capacity,  which  is  singularly  foolish  and  utterly 
unheroic. 

A  very  few  days  after  Kerr's  regulation  papers  had  been 
filed  at  the  Government  Boards  concerned  with  such  busi- 
ness, Lorenzo  had  arranged  for  a  most  important  interview 
with  an  old  Manchu  Prince  who  wielded  untold  power 
behind  the  scenes,  and  who  was  reputed  to  have  become 
fabulously  rich  by  making  himself  a  convenient  channel 
between  Europeans  who  desired  special  privileges  in  China, 
and  the  Central  Government,  which,  in  spite  of  all  the  les- 
sons it  had  received  in  the  past,  still  remained  openly 
obstructionist.  Lorenzo  explained  volubly  to  Kerr  that, 
for  instance,  the  Board  of  Foreign  Affairs  would  be  very 
polite,  would  be  very  accommodating,  would  be  everything 
mortal  man  might  desire;  but  that  until  wheels  had  been 
set  working  behind  the  scenes  there  would  be  absolutely  no 
business  possible,  no  matter  how  ably  he  might  argue  his 
case  or  how  much  open  pressure  he  might  bring  to  bear. 
The  beginning  and  end  of  Chinese  diplomacy  was  to  pro- 


i96  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

crastinate — to  put  off,  to  delay ;  and  likewise  the  beginning, 
the  middle,  and  the  end  of  his  work  would  merely  be  to 
fight  those  tactics.  That  was  the  problem  in  a  nutshell ;  and 
he  would  show  him  the  only  way  to  find  the  true  solution. 

How  the  Italian  had  been  able  to  become  so  intimate  with 
the  secret  springs  of  power  in  Peking,  no  one  exactly  knew. 
But  that  he  did  know  what  he  was  talking  about  was  cer- 
tainly a  fact.  He  never  forgot,  for  instance,  that  the  real 
masters  here  were  the  Manchus,  and  that  to  produce  any 
really  abiding  results  in  China  it  was  necessary  to  reach  the 
highest  among  these  men  and  to  secure  their  support.  Their 
lips  alone  could  pronounce  the  magic  "Open  sesame"  which 
made  officials  nominally  in  complete  charge  of  affairs  sud- 
denly throw  open  wide  the  portals  of  their  bureaus  and 
really  welcome  the  stranger ;  and  until  their  lips  had  spoken, 
all  was  in  vain. 

Lorenzo's  methods  were  radically  different  from  those  gen- 
erally followed.  The  policy  of  haunting  a  Legation  and 
imploring  help  in  order  to  forward  any  particular  scheme 
had  always  appeared  absurd  to  him.  In  view  of  what 
Chinese  diplomacy  really  was,  such  an  attitude  seemed  the 
negation  of  common  sense.  He  would  win  by  his  own  wits, 
he  said,  and  not  with  the  doubtful  aid  of  the  thick  stick, 
which  has  never  been  of  any  real  use  in  China,  since  what  is 
unwillingly  extorted  sooner  or  later  inevitably  suffers  from 
whole-hearted  obstruction.  Consequently,  because  he  held 
such  independent  views,  because  he  acted  so  independently, 
Lorenzo  was  highly  unpopular  and  every  one  invented  absurd 
stories  about  him.  People  do  not  like  men  to  have  too  many 
ideas  of  their  own — especially  in  small  official  communities. 
To  have  original  ideas  is  eminently  suspicious,  since  one 
can  never  be  quite  sure  what  those  ideas  may  be  or  how 
much  success  may  crown  them.  And  then  nothing  is  quite 
so  irritating  as  other  people's  successes. 

Lorenzo  fortunately  cared  little  for  appearances,  or  for 
other  people's  opinions.  He  went  his  own  way  contentedly, 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  197 

quite  contentedly.  He  had  concentrated  his  entire  efforts 
during  weary  months  on  the  sole  business  of  convincing  a 
few  high  personages,  who  understood  very  little  about  such 
things,  that  the  issuance  to  him  of  a  small  piece  of  paper, 
stamped  with  the  great  Imperial  Seal  of  China,  was  a  matter 
of  paramount  importance  both  to  the  welfare  of  the  empire 
and  to  the  personages  concerned.  He  had  already  succeeded 
so  well  in  his  own  venture  that  he  possessed  pledges  making 
the  issuance  of  that  final  piece  of  all-important  paper  a  mere 
matter  of  time.  When  he  had  obtained  it  stock-exchanges 
would  eagerly  welcome  him;  and  that  was  all  he  really 
cared  about. 

On  the  day  on  which  this  particular  interview  had  been 
arranged,  he  stood  in  the  hall  of  the  little  hotel  talking  to 
Kerr  of  these  things  in  a  rambling  way.  He  did  not  tell 
him  very  much,  of  course,  since  that  would  have  been  against 
his  policy.  Still,  he  was  reasonably  communicative,  and 
really  interesting.  Peter  Kerr  had  long  realized  how  differ- 
ent was  the  entire  problem  from  anything  he  had  imagined 
before  he  had  come  to  China.  Then  it  had  seemed  to  him 
that  his  scheme,  embodying  as  it  did  every  possible  advan- 
tage, would  be  something  which  could  be  made  highly 
acceptable  to  a  government  which  had  hitherto  been 
treated  with  scant  courtesy.  Now  it  was  quite  plain  to 
him  that  years  would  have  to  elapse  before  this  government, 
which  he  had  once  pictured  to  himself  as  something  approxi- 
mating a  European  government,  could  possibly  be  educated 
up  to  the  exigencies  of  the  hour  and  see  these  good  points. 
This  government  was  now  mainly  engaged  in  making  the 
best  compromises  it  could  with  the  insistent  demands  coming 
from  all  sides — always  hoping  that  if  saving  clauses  were 
inserted  in  every  contract  and  agreement  which  might  be 
signed,  sealed,  and  delivered,  the  whirligig  of  time,  aided 
by  a  policy  of  passive  resistance,  might  ultimately  allow 
matters  to  revert  to  their  pristine  state.  This  Chinese  gov- 
ernment was  therefore  in  no  mood  for  grand  reconstructive 


ig8  THE   HUMAN    COBWEB 

measures.  It  was  nervous  about  its  own  fate,  and  at  heart 
it  cared  nothing  really  for  regeneration,  about  which  many 
people  were  speaking. 

And  slowly  but  surely  this  nervousness  was  spreading  ever 
farther  afield — spreading  from  Peking  to  the  provinces. 
Russia,  having  obtained  what  she  wanted  by  a  mixed  policy 
of  bluff  and  alleged  friendship,  was  beginning  to  show  her 
claws.  Germany  was  not  far  behind;  and  there  were  con- 
stant rumours  that  all  the  Powers  would  soon  be  acting  in 
much  the  same  way  all  over  China.  It  looked  as  if  a  period 
of  storm  and  stress  was  beginning — a  period  which  every- 
body professed  to  be  afraid  of — but  nevertheless  which  every- 
body was  hurrying  along. 

There  was  something  very  remarkable  in  Peter  Kerr's 
eyes  in  this  little  official  European  colony  which  was  planted 
in  the  very  heart  of  a  barbarous  old-world  capital,  and 
which  was  bringing  on  by  its  manifold  activities  complica- 
tion after  complication,  each  of  which  was  only  solved  by 
giving  birth  to  yet  other  complications,  which  in  turn  would 
contribute  perceptibly  towards  making  the  cracks  in  the 
ancient  Chinese  edifice  wider  and  wider.  There  was  a  sort 
of  careless  insolence  about  it  all  which  was  somehow  remi- 
niscent of  the  symptoms  before  the  old  English  rebellion,  the 
American  Revolution,  the  French  Revolution.  Something 
was  slowly  pushing  things  along  in  the  wrong  direction ; 
something  was  perpetually  disclosing  that  it  could  not  go 
on  forever  like  this.  It  was  politically  monstrous  to  sup- 
pose that  a  scramble  similar  to  the  scramble  which  had  taken 
place  in  Africa  could  occur  in  this  vast  empire  without  great 
bloodshed  and  unending  trouble.  The  Chinese  were  not 
Kaffirs  or  Negroes;  they  were  a  remarkably  astute  people, 
whose  military  weakness  was  simply  being  taken  advantage 
of  somewhat  unblushingly,  and  yet  who,  when  they 
thoroughly  understood  what  all  this  meant,  would  probably 
attempt  to  bring  about  surprising  developments. 

Peter  Kerr,  as  he  listened  to  Lorenzo,  saw  how  clever 
was  his  policy  of  slipping  in  modestly  through  back  doors 


THE   HUMAN    COBWEB  199 

and  accomplishing  his  purpose,  whilst  the  glamour  of  greater 
doings  kept  most  people's  attention  away  from  him.  He 
had  no  doubt  at  all  that  Lorenzo  would  succeed  in  his  own 
particular  venture  before  the  tide  turned.  The  many  others, 
with  their  "copies  of  memoranda  exchanged,"  their  "pre- 
liminary agreements,"  and  all  those  other  adjuncts  to  inter- 
national finance  and  cosmopolitan  industrialism,  would  be 
Waiting  and  intriguing  and  fretting  at  the  delays  imposed 
on  them  by  their  Legations,  because  national  projects 
must  take  precedence  of  private  projects,  whilst  Lorenzo, 
with  the  life-buoy  of  an  unreversible  Imperial  Decree 
securely  attached  to  him,  would  be  swimming  far  away  down 
the  stream  of  success. 

Just  then  Carnot  entered  the  hall  with  a  very  important 
and  mysterious  air.  His  habitually  cadaverous  face  was 
deeply  flushed  and  he  looked  excited.  He  took  off  his  sun- 
helmet,  wiped  the  perspiration  from  his  forehead,  and  then 
called  loudly.  A  pair  of  slumbering  servants  in  their  long 
blue  coats  started  up  and  hurried  towards  him.  To  one  he 
threw  his  sun-helmet;  to  the  other  he  called  for  a  whisky 
and  soda.  Then  he  turned  to  the  two  men. 

"Good-morning,"  he  began  in  his  cavernous  voice,  first 
glancing  round  to  see  that  there  was  no  one  else  near.  "I 
have  just  heard  a  little  piece  of  news — absolutely  confiden- 
tial. I  can  only  whisper  it  to  you.  The  old  lady  in  the 
Palace  there" — he  jerked  his  head  in  the  direction  of  the 
Forbidden  City — "is  going  to  order  up  a  horde  of  troops 
who  will  be  camped  near  Peking.  I  can  guarantee  that  it  is 
true.  I  heard  it  an  hour  ago  from  an  old  friend  of  mine, 
a  eunuch  in  the  Palace — a  fat  fellow  who  likes  champagne 
and  who  procures  curios  for  me.  What  do  you  think  of 
that?  A  whole  horde  of  troops!  That  means  that  some- 
thing big — something  very  big — is  anticipated." 

He  nodded  his  head  pensively,  and  continued  to  wipe  his 
forehead  with  a  silk  handkerchief. 

"Anyway,"  he  ended,  as  if  some  one  had  been  arguing  with 
him,  "the  news  is  on  its  way  home.  It  will  give  them 


200  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

something  to  think  about  in  Europe  just  now,  I  warrant  you. 
They  do  not  begin  to  understand  what  is  going  on  here." 

Just  then  somebody  pushed  open  the  hall  doors  and  peered 
in ;  and  for  a  moment  there  was  impressed  on  the  three  men 
standing  there  silently  a  bright  sunlit  vision  of  the  endless 
tide  of  men,  animals,  and  carts  sweeping  noisily  down  the 
street  enveloped  in  billows  of  dust.  Then  the  doors  swung 
to  suddenly  with  a  bang,  shutting  out  this  alien  world  arid 
confining  it  to  its  own  limits. 

The  motion  seemed  to  arouse  Lorenzo.  He  shrugged  his 
shoulders  in  a  characteristic  manner,  and  his  features,  which 
had  shown  signs  of  surprise,  quickly  resumed  their  usual 
half  cynical  expression. 

"It  will  not  come  yet,"  he  said  in  a  final  fashion.  "It  will 
not  come  yet,"  he  repeated. 

"What  will  not  come?"  asked  Kerr  bluntly. 

The  Italian  laughed  sarcastically  and  answered  with  a 
general  explanation. 

"The  trouble,"  he  said  with  an  expansive  gesture,  "is,  as 
I  have  already  explained,  you  and  me  and  our  governments. 
We  are  all  greedy,  very  greedy — and  some  day  there  must  be 
a  great  surprise.  Can  you  blame  the  Chinese?  That  is 
all.  To  show  how  it  is  beginning  to  hurt,  they  begin  to 
move  troops.  But  their  troops  are  a  farce — just  now  at  least. 
I  was  for  six  months  in  a  savage  province  at  the  back  doors 
of  the  empire,  and  I  saw  something  of  them  repressing  a 
rebellion.  It  was  not  nice — but  against  us,  against  our  men, 
it  would  be  nothing " 

He  stopped  abruptly  and  looked  at  Carnot.  But  Carnot 
disagreed. 

"Yes,"  he  grumbled,  "but  how  about  the  Palace? — how 
about  that?  It  is  plain  you  do  not  know  that  side  of  the 
question  properly.  The  old  woman  is  getting  restive,  and 
the  young  Emperor  is  commencing  to  have  ideas — that  is 
the  real  problem  just  now — two  people  who  do  not  agree. 
You  do  not  understand  that." 

?<Qh,"  rejoined  Lorenzo,  "you  cannot  frighten  me  with 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  201 

that,  my  friend.  They  can  fight  in  their  Palace  as  much  as 
they  like:  it  will  not  hurt  us." 

Yet  his  looks  somehow  belied  his  words.  Lorenzo  was  as 
fully  alive  as  any  one  to  the  larger  outlines  of  a  problem 
in  which  he  was  personally  interested  only  in  an  infinitesimal 
portion.  He  knew  that  the  very  weakness  of  the  Throne 
was  in  a  large  measure  its  greatest  strength;  for  that  weak- 
ness was  attributed  by  the  common  people  to  foreign  aggres- 
sion— and  the  Manchus  would  know  how  to  make  that  idea 
a  pivot  on  which  to  swing  things  the  way  they  desired. 
Some  coup  d'etat,  some  Palace  revolution,  the  details  of 
which  would  never  be  properly  known  to  the  world,  might, 
however,  suddenly  introduce  a  factor  with  which  even  his 
supple  dynamics  would  be  unable  to  contend.  He  needed  a 
few  weeks'  more  time — that  he  frequently  confessed — before 
he  would  be  out  of  the  woods.  He  must  have  his  Imperial 
Edict;  and  if  the  Court  began  playing  strange  pranks, 
there  might  be  no  more  Edicts  for  the  foreigner. 

Something  of  these  things  showed  themselves  on  Lorenzo's 
mobile  features  as  he  stood  silently  in  the  primitive  little 
hall  with  the  other  two  men ;  and  as  a  'piano  sounded  sud- 
denly on  the  floor  above  them,  he  started  with  manifest 
irritation. 

"I  wish,  Carnot,"  he  said,  "you  would  beat  a  few  of  your 
carters.  We  have  been  waiting  here  for  half  an  hour,  and 
they  have  not  come  yet." 

He  walked  impatiently  to  the  hall  doors  and  flung  them 
open  again  to  see  if  the  carts  were  there ;  and  Kerr,  who  had 
followed  his  movements  with  his  eyes,  felt  a  flush  rise  to  his 
face  as  he  saw  him  suddenly  change  his  attitude  and  step 
aside  with  a  low  bow. 

A  lady  had  appeared.  She  began  shutting  her  parasol  as 
she  entered  the  hall,  and  for  a  moment  Kerr  could  not  see 
who  it  was.  Then,  as  the  parasol  dropped  to  the  ground, 
his  instinctive  feeling  was  proved  correct.  It  was  Madame 
Boisragon. 

Kerr  went  forward  to  meet  her. 


202  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

"Good-morning,"  he  said  agreeably,  wondering  why  he 
should  have  been  so  prompt.  He  felt  that  the  two  men 
were  watching  him  closely,  and  the  thought  annoyed  him 
sharply. 

"Did  you  not  find  it  very  hot  on  the  street?"  he  continued. 
He  saw  that  Madame  Boisragon's  pale  face  had  become  a 
little  pink  through  the  white  veil  she  was  wearing.  He  felt 
instinctively  that  she  was  angry  with  him — perhaps  because 
he  had  accosted  her  in  the  public  hall  instead  of  letting  her 
pass  with  a  bow.  Yet  he  could  not  understand  why 
that  should  be  so. 

"It  is  certainly  very  hot  out  in  the  sun,"  she  said  a  little 
coldly.  "I  cannot  advise  a  walk  for  pleasure  at  this  hour." 

She  looked  past  him  at  the  stairs.  She  was  plainly  waiting 
for  him  to  move. 

"I  beg  your  pardon,"  he  said,  stepping  aside  as  if  he  had 
suddenly  become  alive  to  the  fact.  "I  am  afraid  I  have 
kept  you." 

She  murmured  a  brief  reply  and  passed  on.  He  watched 
her  gather  up  her  skirts  and  mount  the  stairs  with  a  feeling 
of  curious  disappointment  and  discontent.  He  had  made  a 
mistake  in  speaking,  he  now  felt  sure. 

"Come  on,  Kerr,"  called  Lorenzo  from  the  hall  doors; 
and  Kerr,  hastily  putting  on  his  hat  and  picking  up  his  stick 
and  his  rolls  of  papers,  followed  him  out  of  the  hotel. 
Carnot  had  already  disappeared. 

"I  did  not  know  you  knew  that  lady,"  said  Lorenzo  with 
abrupt  directness,  as  they  stood  for  an  instant  together  beside 
the  carts.  He  looked  suspiciously  at  the  Englishman. 

"I  met  her  the  other  night  at  one  of  the  Legations," 
answered  Kerr  with  feigned  indifference.  He  resented  the 
Italian's  curiosity;  but  for  that  very  reason  he  w&s  strictly 
on  his  guard. 

Lorenzo  folded  his  arms  behind  his  back  and  moistened  his 
lips.  Undoubtedly  he  was  in  a  bad  humour. 

"I  asked  that  question,"  he  began,  "because  I  suppose  you 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  203 

do  not  know  who  the  husband  is.  He  is  the  secret  agent  of 
the  group  who  are  trying  to  secure  a  large  portion  of  the 
very  concession  you  are  seeking.  He  is  therefore  a  rival, 
and  I  may  tell  you  that  these  people  for  whom  he  is  acting 
are  not  only  trying  very  hard  to  get  what  they  want,  but 
that  they  have  twice  almost  succeeded  in  accomplishing 
their  object.  Do  you  understand? — almost  succeeded. 
There  is,  however,  something  not  quite  right  with  them  at 
the  other  end — in  Europe,  I  mean — and  that  is  what  has 
prevented  them  each  time  from  closing  a  definite  contract. 
The  husband  is  a  man  who  has  been  used  everywhere — in 
Africa,  in  South  America,  in  Indo-China.  He  is  very 
capable.  But  there  is  this  home  difficulty  which  crops  up 
when  the  usual  guarantees  are  demanded.  The  guarantees 
asked  for  are  enormous.  From  what  I  have  gathered  this 
difficulty  may  be  got  over  at  any  moment,  and  then,  unless 
we  have  introduced  a  new  factor  into  this  problem,  the 
question  of  your  scheme  will  be  irrevocably  decided.  I  hope 
I  have  made  myself  clear  ?" 

"Certainly,"  began  Kerr,  "but  still  I  don't  see " 

Lorenzo  smiled  sarcastically. 

"You  don't  know  this  place  and  these  transactions,"  he 
interrupted.  "Anything  may  matter.  You  might  be 
betrayed  into  an  indiscretion  which  would  give  a  clue  to 
that  man  Boisragon  as  to  what  you  were  doing.  Do  you 
suppose  that  you  are  not  being  watched  by  a  dozen  people?" 

A  new  light  broke  on  Peter  Kerr. 

"Watched?"  he  inquired,  a  little  amazed.  "Why  should 
I  be  watched?" 

Lorenzo   expostulated   with   his   arm. 

"As  well  inquire  why  the  sun  is  shining!  You  are  watched 
for  very  obvious  reasons.  If  you  think  for  a  minute,  you 
will  see  that  your  presence  here  must  alone  have  furnished  a 
great  deal  of  food  for  conversation.  People  here  have 
nothing  to  do  but  to  talk — and  intrigue.  As  the  bank  agents 
necessarily  know  everything  about  people  empowered  to  draw 
large  sums  of  money,  they  can  furnish  one  another  with 


204  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

financial  details.  As  for  the  general  details,  I  tell  you 
frankly  that  I  can  give  you  the  names  of  the  places  in  the 
interior  where  your  surveyors  are  at  present.  I  learnt  that 
at  the  Club  yesterday.  Well,  what  do  you  think  of  that? 
It  does  not  take  a  genius,  then,  to  work  out  roughly  from 
such  indications  what  you  are  trying  for.  There  are  only 
two  points  which  can  possibly  remain  obscure:  first,  what 
your  exact  scheme  may  be — that  is,  how  you  propose  to  make 
it  acceptable  to  the  Chinese  government;  and  second,  how 
much  financial  backing  you  can  count  on  so  as  to  beat  all 
competitors.  And  those  are  exactly  the  two  points  which  at 
all  costs  must  be  kept  secret." 

Lorenzo  abruptly  ended  his  little  lecture  by  entering  his 
Peking  cart.  Kerr  silently  climbed  into  the  second  one, 
whilst  their  two  interpreters  mounted  the  third. 

He  would  have  liked  to  have  discussed  the  matter  a  little 
further;  but  he  refrained.  He  knew  that  Lorenzo  would 
become  very  uncommunicative  directly  he  imagined  that  an 
attempt  was  being  made  to  exploit  his  one  great  asset — his 
fertile  and  well-stored  brain.  The  morning's  news  had  evi- 
dently impressed  the  Italian  a  great  deal.  Possibilities 
which  he  did  not  like  to  contemplate  were  drawing  nearer 
and  nearer;  and  this,  taken  in  conjunction  with  the  last 
surprise  which  Kerr  had  given  him,  had  completed  his  vexa- 
tion. His  outburst  of  frankness  had  really  been  an  explosion 
of  temper. 

All  the  way  along  the  great  thoroughfares  they  were  soon 
threading,  their  ears  filled  with  the  unending  rattle-clatter 
of  the  immensely  heavy  wheels  grinding  on  the  thick  axle- 
trees,  Peter  Kerr  pondered  on  the  extraordinary  difficulties 
which  now  surrounded  him.  From  a  technical  and  finan- 
cial point  of  view  things  were  much  the  same,  he  felt  con- 
vinced, as  the  day  he  had  expounded  them  to  Sir  James 
Barker  and  his  associates.  Yet  in  spite  of  this  he  felt 
that  he  might  almost  as  well  have  prepared  a  giant  scheme 
for  the  reform  of  the  currency  of  the  country ;  or  for  giving 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  205 

the  rulers  a  conscript  army  of  five  million  men;  or  for 
effecting  some  other  great  and  comprehensive  reform.  Per- 
haps if  he  had  come  a  few  years  earlier,  when  the  close  of 
the  disastrous  war  with  Japan  had  left  the  rulers  with  a 
real  desire  to  inaugurate  measures  which  would  restore  them 
to  their  pristine  glory — perhaps  at  such  a  rare  psychological 
moment  he  would  have  been  welcomed  with  open  arms  and 
have  brought  off  a  coup  which  would  have  been  forever 
famous  in  the  annals  of  railway  enterprise.  As  it  now  was, 
the  field  was  not  only  overcrowded,  but  had  been  actually 
so  worked  over  so  often  that  it  was  littered  with  the  remains 
of  abortive  schemes.  Other  men  had  almost  exactly  the 
same  ideas  as  he  had.  Their  schemes  may  have  lacked 
something  of  the  finish  of  his;  but  still  they  had  embodied 
the  main  ideas — and  that  was  what  made  him  angry. 
Probably  in  the  end  in  China  there  would  be  the  same  muddle 
as  in  India.  If  only  he  could  explain  that.  If  only 

The  line  of  carts,  travelling  one  behind  the  other  in  Indian 
file,  came  to  such  a  sudden  halt  that  each  mule  cannoned, 
with  its  head  into  the  hood  of  the  vehicle  in  front,  and  the 
thread  of  Kerr's  thoughts  was  thus  effectively  snapped.  Con- 
fused shouts  apprised  him  that  something  untoward  had 
occurred,  and  so,  sliding  forward  from  the  uncomfortable 
crouching  position  which  the  old-fashioned  Peking  cart 
necessitated,  he  jumped  to  the  ground  and  walked  inquiringly 
up  to  the  leading  cart  in  which  was  Lorenzo. 

A  fast-collecting,  blue-coated  crowd,  sucked  up  quickly 
from  the  passing  throng  as  a  sponge  sucks  up  water,  made  it 
necessary  for  him  to  shoulder  his  way  roughly  forward. 
Instead  of  yielding  readily  to  his  pressure,  as  was  generally 
the  case  with  these  easy-going  natives,  Kerr  divined  in  the 
sullen  manner  in  which  they  now  gave  way,  something 
ominous. 

He  was  not  wrong.  Lorenzo  was  still  sitting  on  the  shafts 
of  his  cart  just  as  he  had  started,  but  his  hat  was  now  off 
and  he  was  pressing  to  his  face  a  blue  silk  handkerchief,  which 
was  rapidly  becoming  an  unseemly  red-black. 


206  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

Kerr  saw  at  once  that  he  was  bleeding  badly.  Uncere- 
moniously he  kicked  the  nearest  of  the  crowd  back. 

"What  the  devil's  happened,  Lorenzo?"  he  inquired 
anxiously,  pulling  out  his  own  handkerchief  and  handing  it 
to  the  Italian.  "Who  hit  you?  Can  you  point  out  the 
man?" 

The  Italian,  before  answering,  finished  mopping  away  the 
blood.  Then  he  picked  up  a  jagged  stone  which  had  fallen 
into  the  cart  and  showed  it  to  Kerr.  His  lips,  nose,  and 
cheeks  had  been  sharply  cut. 

"It  is  nothing,"  he  said  in  jerks,  spitting  the  blood  from 
his  mouth,  "a  little  cut,  a  little  blood,  and  that  is  all.  I 
have  had  it  worse  before — in  Egypt,  in  Siam." 

He  finished  wiping  his  face  carefully  without  adding  any- 
thing further.  There  was  something  in  his  simple  acceptance 
of  a  disagreeable  fact  and  his  quietness  which  oddly  affected 
the  Englishman. 

"I  am  really  awfully  sorry,  Lorenzo,"  he  began.  "It  is 
on  my  business,  too.  I  wish  it  had  been  me  instead  of  you. 
Damn  you!"  He  turned  fiercely  on  the  crowd  again,  and 
scattered  them  like  chaff. 

A  strange  expression  suddenly  crossed  the  Italian's  face; 
it  was  as  if  some  forgotten  chord  had  been  touched.  He 
looked  steadily  at  his  companion  with  his  keen  black  eyes 
over  his  blood-stained  handkerchief. 

"I  will  not  forget  what  you  have  said,  Kerr,"  he  replied 
quietly.  "But  the  blow — is  nothing.  It  is  part  of  the  price 
to  be  paid  for  extorting  success  from  unwilling  elements. 
Look  at  them,"  he  exclaimed  a  trifle  melodramatically,  "and 
do  not  be  surprised." 

He  waved  his  hand  round  at  the  mass  of  inquisitive  brown 
faces  now  peering  at  the  scene  from  a  safe  middle  distance. 
Farther  down  on  either  side  of  the  great  thoroughfare, 
other  hundreds  had  been  lured  to  a  stop  by  the  commotion 
on  the  central  driving-road.  The  curious  barbaric-looking 
shops,  with  their  immense  sign-posts  of  gold  and  red  and 
black  and  their  fantastic  irregular  fronts,  seemed  likewise 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  207 

full  of  people  in  an  attitude  of  suspense.  Everything  had 
stopped — for  an  instant.  It  suddenly  seemed  to  Peter  Kerr 
once  more  like  a  scene  in  a  theatre. 

Lorenzo,  having  stopped  the  bleeding  at  last,  put  on  his 
hat.  The  two  interpreters,  nervous  and  pale  with  anxiety 
at  this  unexpected  incident,  were  busily  questioning  the 
carter.  The  carter  protested  complete  ignorance;  a  stone 
had  been  thrown  and  had  hit  the  foreign  gentleman — that 
was  all  he  knew.  Let  them  strike  him  dead  if  he  knew  more. 
Who  could  tell  who  had  thrown  it?  Look  at  the  number 
of  people  in  the  street 

The  Italian  cut  short  the  interpreters  with  some  harshness. 
It  was  the  first  irritation  he  had  shown. 

"Mr.  Liang  and  Mr.  Chun,"  he  said,  addressing  the  two 
men  by  name,  "we  have  had  enough  of  this  thing.  On  no 
account  do  I  wish  you  to  mention  it.  I  cut  my  face  by 
falling  from  my  cart — do  you  understand?  By  falling  from 
my  cart.  Not  a  word  to  any  one.  Now  push  on." 

The  carters  chirruped  to  their  mules,  and  the  buzz  and 
murmur  of  excitement  were  soon  left  behind.  As  Lorenzo 
had  said,  these  things  were  part  of  the  price  paid  for  extort- 
ing success  from  unwilling  elements;  it  was  merely  foolish 
to  repine. 

For  Lorenzo,  that  singular  man  had  already  forgotten  the 
incident  as  far  as  its  personal  application  was  concerned.  As 
he  sat  in  his  cart,  he  was  trying  to  connect  it  with  the 
alleged  news  Carnot  had  obtained  from  the  Palace  by  means 
of  his  friend  the  eunuch.  Lorenzo  knew  Asia  and  Africa 
sufficiently  well  to  understand  that  there  is  a  close  and 
subtle  connection  between  all  events — large  and  small, 
important  and  unimportant.  Was  there  anything  in  the 
incident  or  not? — that  was  what  was  worrying  him.  If  he 
could  have  learnt  definitely  he  would  have  suffered  many 
worse  blows. 


CHAPTER  XIII 

"II  n'y  a  point  de  patrie  dans  le  despotique; 
d'autres  choses  y  suppleent,  1'interet,  la  gloire, 
le  service  du  prince." — LA  BRUY!RE. 

THE  interview  with  the  high  Manchu  Prince  was,  on  the 
whole,  a  great  success.  Lorenzo,  who  was  an  expert  in 
such  matters,  pronounced  himself  quite  satisfied.  He  even 
said  that  they  had  had  remarkable  luck.  Whether  subtle 
movements  were  in  process  of  incubation  or  not  in  the  capi- 
tal, it  was  immediately  made  quite  plain  to  the  two  men  that 
this  Peking  dignitary  deemed  the  times  singularly  pro- 
pitious to  add  a  little  more  money  to  his  stores  of  treasure; 
and  accordingly  he  was  very  gracious  and  very  helpful  in 
his  attitude. 

Peter  Kerr  had  at  once  forgotten  the  many  sensations  of 
the  morning  in  the  interest  which  was  excited  in  him  as  soon 
as  they  had  driven  into  the  first  immense  stone-flagged 
courtyard — a  courtyard  full  of  retainers  and  impressive  in 
a  very  peculiar  way.  This  courtyard  was  shut  off  from  the 
bustle  of  the  plebeian  world  by  great  barred  gates,  painted 
red  and  made  of  the  most  massive  timbers.  Beside  the  gates 
watched  the  usual  Gargantuan  stone  lions,  a  ludicrous  con- 
tentment overspreading  their  fat  features,  whilst  chevaux-de- 
frises  were  so  ranged  between  them  that  only  one  cart  could 
drive  in  at  a  time.  Green  trees,  possessing  great  branches 
and  gnarled  trunks  to  attest  their  old  age,  imparted  a  pleas- 
ant air  of  coolness  and  restfulness  to  the  Palace  grounds. 
The  trees  were  mostly  arranged  in  avenues,  after  the  seign- 
eurial  fashion  of  the  capital;  but  some  of  the  noblest  stood 
in  pleasant  groves,  shading  wells  or  lending  additional 
beauty  to  artistic  little  pavilions  which  crowned  artificial 
hillocks,  where  doubtless  the  inmates  took  the  air  on  hot 


THE   HUMAN    COBWEB  209 

summer  evenings.  There  was,  above  all,  in  these  court- 
yards an  air  of  spaciousness  and  dignity — the  subtle  imprint 
of  the  habit  of  commanding,  of  being  paid  attention  to— 
which  seemed,  by  contrast  with  the  rest  of  the  rude  and 
rough  capital,  to  belong  to  far-off  days;  days  when  the 
Eight  Iron-capped  Princes  and  the  Eight  Banners  and  the 
Red  Girdles  and  the  Yellow  Girdles  were  living,  vital 
facts — that  is,  when  the  ruling  Manchu  clan  was  really 
mighty  and  feared  not  only  in  this  Chinese  land,  which  lay 
captive  to  their  spear  and  bow,  but  in  the  outer  world  as 
well — the  world  designated  in  all  sincerity  by  them  as  the 
world  of  outer  barbarians,  because  China  was  the  very  centre 
— the  Middle  Kingdom — the  hub  of  civilization  and  culture  ; 
and  because  from  great  China  it  was  manifestly  child's  play 
to  proceed  to  the  conquest  of  the  world,  as  Genghis  Khan 
had  done. 

In  this  first  great  outer  courtyard  of  this  prince,  shut  off 
by  the  big  stately  gates  and  the  immensely  high  walls  from 
the  roaring,  vulgar  throngs  of  the  streets,  it  was  easy  to 
understand  the  old-world  arrogance  which  still  existed  in 
high  quarters  in  Peking  in  spite  of  the  great  changes  which 
had  come.  The  very  phrasing  of  the  Imperial  Decrees — 
a  phrasing  imitated  by  the  Manchu  princes  and  copied  again 
once  more  by  their  henchmen  in  their  minor  acts,  calling 
upon  one  and  all,  when  orders  were  given,  to  "tremble  and 
obey" — was  indicative  of  this  inherited  pride  springing  from 
a  belief  in  an  inalienable  superiority.  The  pride — offspring 
of  this  belief — was  a  very  old  thing,  and  was  held,  so  to 
speak,  by  prescription — that  is,  by  a  custom  continued  until 
it  had  become  a  right  and  had  the  force  of  law.  It  mattered 
not  that  this  right  had  been  really  usurped  less  than  three 
centuries  before,  when  the  conquest  of  China  had  suddenly 
turned  a  warlike  and  barbarian  Manchurian  tribe  into  a 
ruling  race.  By  a  polite  fiction  this  break  in  Chinese  Impe- 
rial History  was  so  obscured  as  to  enable  the  Manchus  to 
assume  the  prerogatives  of  haughtiness  and  exclusiveness 
which  had  surrounded  the  Dragon  Throne  and  its  imme- 


210  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

diate  adherents  for  thirty  long  centuries.  The  Manchus 
were  the  Great  Moguls  of  China.  The  glory  of  Chinese 
culture  and  civilization  had  passed  like  a  cloak  from  the 
shoulders  of  the  expiring  Ming  dynasty  to  the  shoulders  of 
the  new  dynasty  when  they  had  usurped  the  Throne;  and 
the  new  dynasty,  being  essentially  a  military  dynasty,  had 
understood  well  the  expediency  of  sharing  this  glory  with 
its  newly  created  princes,  its  countless  relatives,  and  its 
faithful  soldiery.  Thus  a  caste  had  been  created  really  as 
distinctive  as  the  ruling  English  caste  in  India,  yet  without 
the  grave  limitation  of  a  colour  difference.  And  in  this  way 
Peking  had  been  given  an  Imperialism  more  highly  special- 
ized than  any  known  since  the  days  when  Kublai  Khan, 
grandson  of  Genghis  Khan,  had  founded  in  the  thirteenth 
century  his  entrenched  city  of  Cambaluc,  or  Peking,  in 
which  his  roving  Mongol  hordes  might  dwell  forever  in 
peace. 

Peter  Kerr  could  not  help  thinking  of  all  this  marvellous 
history  after  they  had  climbed  out  of  their  carts  and  stood 
waiting  until  they  should  be  ceremoniously  ushered  into 
the  presence  of  the  great  man  himself.  Having  purposely 
allowed  a  few  minutes  to  go  by  in  this  uncomfortable  waiting, 
the  t'mg  ch'ai,  or  official  servants,  had  at  last  raised  the 
great  red  Chinese  visiting-cards  high  up  above  their  heads  in 
the  manner  which  politeness  dictates;  and  holding  them 
thus,  they  had  led  the  party  in  a  compact  body  through  a 
second  smaller  gate,  which  had  long,  low  outhouses  furnished 
with  latticed  windows  extending  far  along  on  either  side  of 
it.  Peter  Kerr  had  noticed  that  through  these  latticed 
windows  dozens  of  curious  eyes  were  peeping  at 
them;  for  the  Prince,  like  other  powerful  Manchus, 
dwelt  as  the  barons  of  old — that  is,  with  his  own  people 
garrisoning  his  castle,  and  securing  him  against  all  possible 
dangers. 

In  the  second  or  smaller  courtyard,  into  which  they  were 
now  ushered,  they  had  seen  several  red  Imperial  carts,  with 
the  wheels  set  far  back  instead  of  under  the  body  of  the 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  211 

cart— vehicles  which  in  spite  of  their  clumsiness  were  some- 
how peculiarly  distinguished  in  aspect.  These  carts  were 
backed  right  into  a  circular  side  entrance,  and  retainers  with 
collapsible  screens  of  red  cloth  in  their  hands  stood  ready 
to  cut  off  the  carts  from  all  view.  The  interpreters  had 
whispered  that  some  of  the  Prince's  womenfolk  were  evi- 
dently going  out,  and  that  only  the  very  greatest  in  the  land 
possessed  the  privilege  of  these  red  screens.  Even  on  the 
streets  retainers  paced  beside  the  carts  and  carried  these 
red  screens  folded  in  their  hands.  Immediately  the  outriders 
ahead  caught  sight  of  other  princely  friends  or  acquain- 
tances, the  retainers  were  called  to  and  hoisted  the  red 
screens  and  shrouded  the  carts.  Otherwise  it  would  be 
necessary  for  the  oncoming  cortege  to  stop  and  the  friends 
or  acquaintances  to  descend  from  their  carts  and  pay  their 
respects  in  the  dust  of  the  thoroughfare.  The  fiction  of  the 
red  screens  saved  them  from  that.  Such  were  some  of  the 
privileges  of  high  rank  in  this  clime! 

Thereafter  the  little  party  had  entered  the  first  building, 
only  to  find  themselves  in  a  great  ting*  erh,  or  hall,  unfur- 
nished save  for  a  few  carved  blackwood  seats  and  couches. 
They  had  been  bidden  to  wait  there  for  a  while — doubtless 
to  add  a  little  more  to  the  impressiveness  of  their  visit — and 
finally  they  had  been  ushered  into  the  presence  of  the 
Prince  himself,  who  was  a  fine  old  dignified  man,  clad  in 
a  simple  silk  robe,  and  possessed  of  those  perfect  manners 
which  can  only  be  cultivated  in  peace  and  seclusion. 

It  was  plain  that  the  words  which  had  reached  him  in 
advance  had  dwelt  with  much  insistence  on  the  richness  of 
the  man  who  had  come  ten  thousand  miles  in  quest  of  a 
railway  El  Dorado.  His  attitude  seemed  to  imply  that  at 
once.  Whilst  they  were  drinking  the  preliminary  tea, 
Peter  Kerr  had  been  much  amused  at  the  amazing  defer- 
ence of  their  interpreters.  Literally  indeed  did  they  tremble 
and  obey!  Almost  before  the  Prince  had  finished  speaking 
they  were  stammering  their  polished  replies.  Yet  through 
all  this  necessary  prologue  Lorenzo  preserved  a  matter-of- 


212  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

fact  and  undemonstrative  attitude,  which  showed  that  he 
was  well  used  to  such  interviews  and  little  impressed  by 
those  measured  preliminaries  which  are  apt  to  affect  new- 
comers. Lorenzo  was  simply  waiting  for  the  business  of 
the  day  to  commence — he  showed  it  in  his  manner;  it 
would  not  be  very  long  delayed,  he  knew,  as  the  Prince,  in 
spite  of  his  good  manners,  would  be  eager  to  know  what  good 
fortune  he  might  count  on. 

Lorenzo  was  not  wrong.  Very  soon  the  Prince  motioned 
to  his  servants  to  withdraw.  And  not  only  did  he  do  this, 
but  he  carefully  followed  them  with  his  eyes  in  a  singular 
manner  to  see  that  they  did  not  remain  within  earshot. 
Having  satisfied  himself  that  they  were  at  last  really  alone, 
he  turned  his  head  abruptly  and  asked  in  a  changed  voice 
how  he  could  be  of  use. 

Lorenzo  began  the  talking,  as  he  proposed  reserving  Kerr 
for  the  technicalities.  The  Italian  very  slowly  and  very 
plainly  explained  that  the  only  thing  they  required  was 
an  impartial  hearing  at  the  hands  of  the  Government  Board 
concerned.  If  they  had  that  they  were  convinced  that  the 
Chinese  government  could  not  favour  any  other  scheme 
than  theirs.  Their  scheme  was,  briefly,  to  undertake  to 
build  and  equip  some  six  thousand  miles  of  railway  so  de- 
signed that  all  the  important  centres  of  the  empire  would  be 
linked  up  for  a  specific  sum  per  mile;  they  would  fully 
equip  the  lines  on  another  basis — that  is,  having  due  regard 
for  possible  traffic  requirements;  and  last  of  all,  they  would 
contract  to  raise  all  the  necessary  loans  at  a  fixed  issue- 
price,  a  fixed  rate  of  interest,  and  a  fixed  commission.  All 
China  would  have  to  do  was  to  sanction  the  scheme  by 
Imperial  Decree  and  to  agree  that  a  Railway  Commission 
including  two  or  three  European  experts  would  sit  in  Peking 
until  one  half  of  the  total  loans  had  been  paid  back.  The 
bondholders  would  be  protected  by  a  mortgage  of  the  lines 
in  question ;  and  the  loans  would  be  for  a  period  of  fifty 
years,  to  be  extinguished  in  forty  repayments,  beginning 
in  the  eleventh  year  after  the  beginning  of  their  construe- 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  213 

tion.  No  foreign  control  of  the  lines  was  required  at  all; 
the  only  thing  that  was  stipulated  was  that  two  or  three 
European  experts  should  be  included  in  the  Railway  Commis- 
sion, so  as  to  give  confidence  to  the  investing  public. 

With  the  Prince  listening  attentively,  the  Italian  repeated 
these  proposals  three  times,  and  after  the  third  time  he  drew 
from  a  black  portfolio  half  a  dozen  copies  in  Chinese  of  these 
various  points  and  tendered  them  to  the  Prince  with  a 
deferential  bow. 

"Tell  His  Highness,"  he  said  finally  to  the  interpreters, 
"that  we  are  placing  ourselves  entirely  in  his  hands.  If 
these  details  were  known  to  our  rivals  we  would  be  lost." 

The  Prince  listened  and  immediately  smiled  reassuringly. 

"Tell  these  gentlemen,"  he  said  in  reply,  "that  I  have  in 
my  hands  many  secrets  which  if  they  were  known  would 
cost  me  far  more  than  this  one  secret  would  cost  them." 

He  folded  the  memoranda  given  him  in  a  small  bundle 
and  slipped  them  under  his  girdle.  It  was  plain  that  in 
spite  of  his  exquisite  manners  he  could  be  most  businesslike. 

"Now,  Kerr,"  said  Lorenzo,  "it  is  your  turn  with  the 
plans." 

Kerr  spread  out  on  his  knees  a  dozen  rolls  of  drawing- 
paper,  on  which  he  had  laboured  many  hours  in  company 
with  his  interpreters,  carrying  out  as  clearly  as  possible  the 
Italian's  suggestion  to  produce  something  simple  with 
Chinese  explanations  filled  in.  What  he  had  done  was  very 
effective. 

First  he  handed  the  Prince  what  looked  something  like 
an  admiralty  chart  in  Chinese.  The  natural  features  of 
the  country,  however,  were  all  neatly  filled  in,  and  over 
the  whole  was  boldly  traced  in  double  red  lines  the  railway 
system  which  they  proposed  to  build.  This  was  the  key 
to  the  dozen  detailed  plans  which  followed — each  separate 
plan  treating  as  clearly  as  possible,  after  an  ingenious  system 
suggested  by  Lorenzo,  a  separate  section  of  the  railway 
network.  After  going  over  the  ground  carefully  several 
times  just  as  Lorenzo  had  done,  Kerr  showed  finally  how 


214  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

all  the  detailed  plans  could  be  clamped  together  making  one 
well-arranged  whole.  The  Prince  smiled  in  satisfaction 
at  the  ingenuity  which  had  been  displayed. 

"Tell  these  gentlemen,"  he  said  once  more  to  the  inter- 
preters, "that  this  is  all  more  satisfactory  and  clearer  than 
anything  I  have  seen.  They  have  been  very  intelligent." 
It  was  quite  plain  that  he  understood. 

For  the  first  time  during  the  interview,  Lorenzo  smiled 
genially.  He  was  becoming  satisfied.  Kerr  noticed  that 
as  he  smiled  the  ugly  cut  on  his  lip  was  disclosed.  It 
seemed  to  give  something  ominous  to  his  smile,  as  if  he  would 
one  day  ask  and  enforce  payment  for  the  hurt.  But  the 
Italian's  mind  was  still  plainly  concentrated  on  the  busi- 
ness of  the  day — his  wound  could  wait — he  had  indeed  for- 
gotten it. 

"We  are  very  pleased,"  he  said  slowly,  "that  the  Prince 
has  been  so  kind  to  us.  We  are  afraid  that  we  have  taken 
up  too  much  of  his  time,  and  we  would  only  like  to  ask 
him  how  soon  it  will  be  possible  to  convey  to  us  a  mes- 
sage." That  was  what  Lorenzo  said. 

The  expression  of  the  Prince's  face,  hitherto  so  alert  and 
so  intelligent,  suddenly  changed.  A  blankness  overspread 
his  features  which  was  a  masterpiece  of  acting.  He  spread 
out  his  delicate  hands  as  if  the  problem  which  he  had  been 
given  to  solve  was  so  difficult  that  he  could  not  possibly  com- 
mit himself  just  now.  Words  flowed  from  his  lips  so 
smoothly  and  so  fast  that  the  interpreters  had  difficulty  even 
in  following  with  a  garbled  version. 

Lorenzo  suddenly  interrupted  it  all  by  standing  up  and 
giving  a  nod  to  Kerr. 

"Mr.  Liang  and  Mr.  Chun,"  he  said  abruptly  to  the  in- 
terpreters, "will  you  just  glance  out  of  the  doors  and  see 
if.  you  can  find  any  trace  of  our  carts?" 

The  interpreters  bowed  themselves  away. 

"Now,  Kerr,"  said  Lorenzo. 

Kerr,  not  without  some  embarrassment,  drew  an  envelope 


THE   HUMAN    COBWEB  215 

from  his  pocket  and  handed  it  to  the  Prince  with  some  un- 
intelligible words.  It  was  the  first  time  he  had  ever  adapted 
himself  to  these  new  business  requirements,  and  frankly  he 
did  not  like  it.  But  Lorenzo  had  been  inexorable.  Either 
he  must  follow  the  proper  course  or  pack  his  trunks  and  go 
home — that  was  what  Lorenzo  had  told  him  repeatedly. 
And  that  was  the  reason  why  this  envelope  appeared. 

The  Prince,  however,  showed  no  such  embarrassment  as 
Peter  Kerr.  With  studied  deliberation  he  opened  the  en- 
velope and  drew  forth  the  cheque  Kerr  had  placed 
inside.  He  scrutinized  the  figures  carefully,  and  Lorenzo, 
who  knew  sufficient  of  the  vernacular  for  that,  explained 
to  him  that  it  was  an  order  for  English  gold  pounds. 

The  Prince  lost  himself  in  smiles  and  protests.  It  was  im- 
possible to  know  what  he  did  not  say.  Lorenzo,  following 
up  his  advantage,  partly  by  signs  and  partly  by  the  use  of 
his  small  vocabulary,  now  sought  to  impress  upon  the  Prince 
the  excellence  of  the  project  submitted  to  his  care.  To  do 
this  he  thumped  the  plans  and  repeated  again  and  again  a 
few  set  phrases. 

The  Prince  nodded  back  approvingly  and  shook  his  head 
affirmatively.  Then,  with  a  sudden  movement  he  stooped 
down  and  placed  the  envelope  in  his  cloth  boot. 

The  thing  was  over. 

"Have  you  seen  the  carts?"  called  Lorenzo  significantly  to 
the  interpreters.  "If  so,  you  can  come  back." 

The  interpreters,  who  had  been  standing  far  away  turning 
their  backs  towards  the  little  comedy,  wheeled  at  once  and 
returned.  From  the  blank  expression  on  their  faces  it  was 
plain  that  nobody  with  any  good  taste  ever  understands 
things  not  concerning  them. 

"The  carts  should  be  ready  by  now,"  remarked  one  of  them 
blandly. 

"Then  we  must  go,"  replied  Lorenzo.  Intimacy  being 
now  discreetly  banished,  they  began  saying  farewell  to  the 
Prince  with  the  greatest  ceremony.  They  thanked  him  for 


2i6  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

having  listened  to  them;  they  thanked  him  for  his  support, 
which  they  now  ventured  to  assume  was  assured;  they 
begged  the  interpreters  to  convey  the  most  fervid  expressions 
of  their  great  esteem.  Then  Lorenzo  suddenly  stopped  and 
changed  his  manner.  It  was  very  prettily  done. 

"I  wish,"  he  said,  "to  impress  one  last  thing  on  the  Prince. 
The  Syndicate  we  mainly  fear  is  a  French  group  who  have 
doubtless  submitted  their  estimates  in  francs.  Now  per- 
haps compared  with  these  estimates  our  figures  may  seem 
high;  but  then  the  English  gold  pound  is  worth  twenty-five 
times  the  value  of  the  franc,  and  all  our  calculations  and 
payments  are  made  in  these  gold  pounds.  Does  the  Prince 
understand  that?" 

The  interpreters  explained  volubly  for  a  few  seconds;  and 
at  once  a  winning  and  comprehending  smile  broke  over  the 
Prince's  face. 

"I  understand  fully  the  value  of  the  gold  pound,"  he  said 
reassuringly,  and  with  that,  begging  him  not  to  accompany 
them  to  the  gates  as  politeness  bound  him  to  do,  they  finally 
said  the  last  good-bye.  The  servants  flung  doors  wide  open 
— there  was  a  babel  of  words — it  was  now  absolutely  fin- 
ished. 

"There  is  no  such  ceremony  out  here,"  remarked  Lorenzo 
a  few  minutes  later,  as,  surrounded  by  the  Palace  servants, 
they  prepared  to  mount  their  carts.  He  now  drew  from  his 
pockets  several  heavy  rolls  of  silver  dollars,  and  breaking 
the  wrappers,  he  began  distributing  the  money  with  the 
utmost  phlegm  among  the  servants,  who,  as  is  customary, 
bobbed  their  right  knee  in  the  Manchu  way,  then  stood 
stiffly  at  attention,  with  their  arms  beside  them,  and  thanked 
their  donor  in  formal  tones.  There  seemed  no  end  to 
these  people;  and  yet  Lorenzo  had  enough  money  to  give 
to  each  the  proper  sum. 

"This  is  called  gate-money,"  he  explained  when  he  had 
finished  to  Kerr,  who  was  watching  him  with  a  rather  grim 
smile.  "And  the  next  time  you  come  you  will  notice  all 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  217 

the  difference  in  the  world.  It  is  amiable  custom  founded 
on  a  proper  understanding  of  human  nature." 

It  was  with  a  very  large  and  imposing  crowd  of  bowing 
servants  watching  them  that  they  at  length  drove  out  of 
the  stately  gates  over  which  watched  the  dignified  stone  lions. 

Lorenao  certainly  understood  his  business. 


CHAPTER  XIV 

"De  loin  c'est  quelque  chose,  et  de  pres  ce  n'est 
rien." — LA  FONTAINE. 

IF  Kerr  had  hoped  that  anything  sensational  was  destined  to 
occur  after  these  events,  he  was  doomed  to  signal  disappoint- 
ment. Days  went  by  in  quietness  and  utter  uneventfulness. 
Lorenzo,  now  sitting  permanently  at  the  same  table  as  him- 
self in  the  little  hotel  dining-room,  had  become  more  enig- 
matical and  more  silent  than  was  his  wont.  Though  he 
still  professed  to  be  satisfied  with  the  general  prospects  of 
success,  he  now  frankly  announced  that  more  time  was 
necessary  than  he  had  thought  would  be  the  case,  even  to 
complete  his  own  nearly  completed  scheme.  New  elements 
had  been  interjected  into  the  problem;  these  would  have 
to  become  either  dissipated  or  modified  by  the  flux  of  time 
— or  perhaps  boldly  attacked — and  any  one  who  supposed 
that  energy  would  be  of  use  in  this  strange  capital  was  a 
fool  ignorant  of  the  real  motive  forces  of  the  East. 

The  subtle  Italian,  as  he  ate  and  drank,  lectured  the  Eng- 
lishman in  odd  little  snatches,  full  of  wisdom  and  strange 
deductions,  full  of  marvellous  knowledge  of  men  and  their 
weaknesses;  and  though  once  or  twice  the  suspicion  may 
have  crossed  Kerr's  mind  that  Lorenzo  was  employing  him 
for  his  own  special  purposes,  he  very  soon  banished  such 
ideas.  Kerr  had  to  recognize  that  whether  he  left  the  capital 
or  not,  Lorenzo's  plans  would  be  but  little  affected.  He 
would  be  hard  put,  perhaps,  for  ready  cash,  but  then  his 
credit  was  good.  Kerr  had  been  careful  to  obtain  inde- 
pendent corroboration  of  all  Lorenzo's  statements.  The 
Italian,  he  found,  was  quite  truthful  when  he  said  that  he 
had  almost  succeeded  with  his  own  particular  venture,  and 
that  for  him  it  had  merely  become  a  question  of  sitting  still 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  219 

and  patiently  waiting.  Provided  a  revolution  did  not  come, 
it  was  as  morally  certain  as  anything  in  this  world  could  be 
that  the  Italian's  concession  would  be  a  fait  accompli,  duly 
sanctioned  by  Edict,  and  therefore  marketable  and  as  good 
as  gold  in  the  pocket. 

Kerr  had  already  communicated  with  Sir  James  Barker 
on  Lorenzo's  account,  duly  forwarding  his  undertaking  that 
a  definite  portion  of  the  share  capital,  to  be  raised  to  work 
this  proposed  mining  concession,  would  be  set  apart  for 
the  handling  of  Kerr's  own  friends  and  sponsors.  By  this 
not  only  would  there  be  an  opportunity  of  recovering  the 
sums  which  the  Italian  had  borrowed,  but  of  securing  hand- 
some profits  as  well.  China  being  an  almost  unexploited 
field,  and  her  reserves  of  wealth  hidden  in  the  earth  having 
been  well  established  by  the  researches  of  scientists,  it  was 
certain  that  on  the  launching  of  any  sound  mining  scheme 
the  public  would  rush  into  the  market  and  thus  enable  the 
underwriters — and  their  nearly-related  brethren,  "the  stags" 
— to  reap  a  golden  harvest.  Kerr,  therefore,  could  afford 
to  congratulate  himself  on  his  decision  in  promptly  accepting 
the  advances  Lorenzo  had  first  made.  The  Italian  had 
become  to  him  a  species  of  collateral  security;  if  his  own 
railway  scheme  came  to  naught,  not  so  very  much  would  be 
lost  provided  his  ally  was  entirely  successful. 

Still,  though  this  was  so,  Kerr  frankly  confessed  to  him- 
self that  he  did  not  understand  the  peculiar  mental  process 
through  which  the  Italian  appeared  to  be  going.  It  seemed 
strange,  indeed  almost  ominous,  that  he  should  become  in- 
fected with  such  moroseness  when  nothing  warranted  any- 
thing but  an  attitude  of  expectancy.  Perhaps  it  was  that 
owing  to  the  secret  nervous  strain  which  he  had  endured  for 
so  many  long  months,  the  mere  fact  that  success  was  so  near 
at  hand  caused  him  to  suffer  from  the  inevitable  mental  re- 
lapse. For  not  only  had  Lorenzo  passed  through  this  strange 
period  of  waiting  in  Peking,  but  previous  to  this  he  had 
hidden  himself  far  away  in  the  capital  of  the  distant  province 
he  proposed  to  exploit,  in  the  utmost  secrecy  and  isolation, 


220  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

with  no  white  soul  near  him,  so  as  to  obtain  that  preliminary 
provincial  consent  which  was  essential  as  a  first  step  before 
attempting  to  obtain  the  Imperial  sanction.  He  had  there- 
fore a  double  dose  of  this  tedious  waiting,  a  penance  accom- 
panied by  exhausting  and  nerve-racking  days  spent  in  argu- 
ing and  convincing  long-headed  Chinamen,  much  against 
their  will,  that  what  he  proposed  to  do,  if  properly  backed 
by  them,  must  inevitably  make  their  fortunes.  He  had 
played  the  game  up  to  the  last  counter  with  the  skill  of  the 
born  gambler;  he  had  been  barely  pulling  through  when 
his  new  connection  with  Kerr  had  practically  insured  success. 
Perhaps  it  was  all  this  as  well  as  the  new  fear  Carnot  had 
recently  communicated  to  the  man. 

The  astute  Swiss  seemed  always  to  get  an  inkling  of  every- 
thing that  was  going  on,  and  was  perpetually  rushing  in 
and  out  with  his  sun-helmet  on  the  back  of  his  head  and  his 
sallow  face  flushed  with  an  angry  tint;  and  though  Lorenzo 
might  pretend  to  pooh-pooh  his  views,  secretly  he  paid  much 
attention  to  them.  Carnot  was  really  just  as  much  at  home 
in  international  or  native  politics  as  he  was  in  the  art  of 
running  a  hotel.  From  his  dusty  little  caravansary,  camped 
immediately  beside  the  Legations  of  the  great  countries  of 
the  world  (and  considered  by  him  fully  as  important),  he 
surveyed  the  peoples  and  politics  of  the  Far  East  with  a  dis- 
criminating and  acute  cynicism.  He  dismissed  the  consid- 
eration of  a  slumbering  world-problem  with  a  contempt- 
uous gesture,  because  he  knew  that  another  question  was 
really  the  question  of  the  hour;  and  he  could  turn  from 
explaining  just  how  the  action  of  one  country  would  finally 
affect  the  actions  of  another  to  a  reasoned  detailing  of  the 
latest  Palace  intrigue,  with  an  assurance  and  an  aplomb 
which,  if  nothing  else,  was  rather  superb. 

It  was  not  wise  to  argue  with  Carnot,  since  his  manners 
did  not  easily  permit  that ;  he  contented  himself,  as  he  put  it, 
with  informing  his  public  either  of  what  was  actually  going 
on,  or  of  what  might  come  about.  He  did  not  talk  to 
argue,  he  said.  It  was  he  who  had  obtained  absolute  infor- 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  221 

mation,  before  any  one  else,  of  the  big  national  loan  which 
had  been  carried  through  so  very  secretly  shortly  after  Peter 
Kerr's  arrival  in  Peking.  How  did  he  obtain  such  informa- 
tion? He  would  not  tell.  Only  sometimes  in  his  expansive 
moments  he  hinted  at  the  value  of  intimacy  with  every  one 
in  this  quarter,  and  even  boasted  of  the  unrivalled  position  he 
had  attained  among  that  whole  heterogeneous  population 
which  always  collects  round  diplomatic  missions  in  Asiatic 
lands.  Carnot  never  refused  a  request  for  help  from  any 
one,  no  matter  how  humble  his  petitioner  might  be.  He 
chaffed,  bullied,  beat,  and  swore  at  the  motley  serving- 
world  from  one  end  of  the  foreign  quarter  to  the  other; 
but  nevertheless  Carnot  was  an  institution  indispensable 
to  the  welfare  of  one  and  all.  It  was  his  magic  which 
secured  at  a  moment's  notice  cooks,  boys,  mafus,  amahs,  and 
all  those  other  necessary  adjuncts  to  the  exile's  life;  and  in 
the  case  of  particular  friends  and  proteges,  whenever  they 
were  menaced  with  great  trouble  he  was  always  ready  to  go 
round  and  swear  false  excuses,  so  that  at  an  opportune  mo- 
ment he  might  be  remembered  and  the  debt  of  gratitude  re- 
paid. Every  morning  there  was  a  blue-coated  queue  of  peti- 
tioners outside  his  office  doors,  waiting  on  his  pleasure.  No 
wonder  that  he  was  beloved  and  received  so  much  informa- 
tion. It  might  seem  like  opera  bouffe,  but  it  was — Oriental 
business. 

During  these  days  of  expectancy,  Kerr  began  to  notice 
that  Carnot's  appearance  was  the  signal  for  a  flash  of  almost 
open  anxiety  on  Lorenzo's  part.  The  Italian  waited,  indeed, 
with  a  tense  concentration  until  Carnot  had  spoken.  As 
often  as  not  Carnot  would  merely  come  up,  shrug  his  lean 
shoulders,  and  shake  his  expressive  head.  Sometimes  he 
would  say,  ffRien,  run  du  tout.  Quest  ce  que  vous  voulez 
ces  animaux  sont  lents,  mats  lents.  .  .  ." — and  then  walk 
away.  A  stranger  hearing  him  would  hardly  have  guessed 
that  he  was  referring  in  this  amiable  way  to  those  who 
controlled  the  destinies  of  four  hundred  millions  of  people. 
As  a  matter  of  fact,  what  he  mainly  implied  was  that  his 


222  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

friend  the  eunuch  had  become  curiously  disappointing.  Great 
surprises  had  been  promised;  nothing  had  come  so  far;  and 
it  was  only  by  blaming  the  inevitable  slowness  of  the 
East  that  it  was  possible  to  justify  his  sensational  forecast. 

Twice  during  these  waiting  days,  Lorenzo,  to  whom  exer- 
cise, as  an  exercise,  meant  absolutely  nothing,  suggested  a 
walk  to  Peter  Kerr;  and  following  out  his  curious  ideas  of 
pedestrianism,  he  had  each  time  strolled  in  the  Englishman's 
company  at  an  exasperatingly  slow  pace  for  a  couple  of 
hours  and  more,  pausing  innumerable  times  to  remark  on 
the  rapidly  increasing  heat  of  north  China.  Yet  these 
walks,  though  dull,  were  pregnant  with  meaning. 

The  first  time  the  Italian  had  taken  Kerr  to  the  top  of  the 
Tartar  Wall — up  one  of  the  broad  ramps  originally  designed 
so  that  clouds  of  defending  soldiery  could  rush  at  an  instant's 
notice  to  the  defence  of  the  city,  without  jostling  one  another 
or  delaying  their  ill-disciplined  movements.  These  neces- 
sary adjuncts  to  mediaeval  defensive  warfare  had  now  become 
mere  staircases  for  promenaders  who  went  in  search  of  fresh 
air  and  exercise.  Peter  Kerr,  being  on  the  Wall  for  almost 
the  first  time,  had  suggested  that  they  should  walk  off  to 
the  ancient  observatory  established  by  the  Jesuits  in  the  time 
of  Louis  the  Fourteenth,  and  furnished  with  wonderful 
bronze  instruments  adorned  with  beautifully  chiselled  drag- 
ons which  were  the  admiration  of  every  globe-trotting  scien- 
tist. 

But  Lorenzo  was  obdurate.  He  would  not  go  there. 
What  was  the  use  of  it  anyway?  It  was  a  long  walk,  and 
another  time  would  do  as  well.  The  observatory  belonged 
to  an  age  long  since  passed.  He  would  take  Kerr,  he 
said,  to  observe  the  much  more  interesting  present. 

So  he  had  walked  him  at  a  slow  and  dignified  pace  to  the 
great  central  gate  of  the  Tartar  city — the  mighty  Ch'ien 
Men,  above  which  a  tower  more  splendid  than  all  the  other 
towers  of  the  city  proudly  rears  itself;  a  tower  of  wood  and 
brick  brilliant  with  reds  and  golds  and  greens  and  blues 
and  full  of  archers'  windows  on  which  are  painted  mock 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  223 

cannon  mouths  in  sombre  black  so  that  an  ingenuous  enemy 
may  be  instantly  defeated  by  being  instantly  dismayed. 
There  was  a  smaller  supporting  tower,  made  entirely  of 
brick  and  therefore  more  unbusinesslike  in  aspect  than  this 
gaudy  centre  one,  standing  on  the  outer  rim  of  the  great 
semicircular  keep  which  had  been  built  to  lend  additional 
strength  to  the  defences  of  the  main  entrance,  and  over 
the  side  entrances  were  blockhouses — the  whole  providing  a 
liberal  education  in  Tartar  ideas  of  defensive  warfare.  The 
extraordinary  strength  of  these  fortifications  could  not  but 
strike  the  most  unobservant  of  men. 

But  it  was  not  to  see  this,  or  to  dwell  on  the  decay  in  the 
picturesque  in  warfare,  that  the  Italian  had  brought  the  Eng- 
lishman up  there;  it  was  for  something  else.  Lorenzo, 
like  most  moderns,  had  little  real  love  for  .grace  or  beauty, 
or  for  the  picturesque.  It  was  power — absolute  power — 
which  attracted  and  entranced  him:  power  to  crush  men  or 
to  crown  them  with  success;  power  to  do  as  it  may  please 
you  at  any  moment  of  the  day  or  night. 

Perhaps  this  was  very  natural  on  his  part.  In  a  democratic 
age,  when  all  men,  if  they  are  not  equal,  at  least  accept  the 
theory  that  liberty  implies  equality,  it  is  really  inspiring  to 
think  of  something  which  can  still  afford  to  disdain  such 
ideas;  which  pushes  on  like  a  Juggernaut's  car  crushing  to 
death,  in  spite  of  all  reputed  law  and  order,  all  who  stand 
in  its  road — which  goes  onwards,  always  onwards,  to  the 
allotted  end.  It  is  great,  it  is  wonderful,  it  is  lovable.  In 
the  West  there  is  now  only  the  multi-millionaire  who  can 
afford  to  be  so  merciless;  in  Asia  there  must  always  exist, 
until  the  end  of  time,  Juggernaut's  cars  in  one  form  or 
another,  forcing  their  way  through  the  prostrated  crowds. 

So  Lorenzo,  as  he  came  under  the  shadow  of  the  great 
Central  Tower,  full  of  such  ideas,  had  slackened  his  pace 
more  and  more,  until  he  hardly  moved.  The  view  was 
sufficiently  magnificent  to  account  for  that.  Straight  in 
front  of  the  two  men  the  ruler-like  Tartar  Wall  now  heaved 
away  on  its  giant  course,  capped  at  regular  intervals  by 


224  THE    HUMAN   COBWEB 

similar  towers  which  stood  proudly  out  against  the  dazzling 
blue  of  the  northern  sky  as  if  they  were  deathless  sentinels. 
A  couple  of  miles  distant,  the  Wall  turned  sharply  to  the 
north,  travelling  once  more  for  several  miles  with  mathe- 
matical accuracy  until  it  had  reached  the  northwest  corner, 
when  once  again  it  bent  to  form  the  parallel  side  of  the 
immense  enclosed  square.  To  the  west  and  north,  where 
they  were  looking,  the  distant  hills  and  mountains  rose  in 
towering  masses,  their  pleasant  green-grey  gradually  shading 
off  into  ominous  dark  blue,  where  these  natural  defences 
frowned  down  on  the  limitless  stretches  of  grassy  Mongolia. 
Only  forty  miles  away,  creeping  like  a  relentless  serpent  up 
the  highest  peaks  and  spurs  and  down  the  most  sweeping 
slopes,  ran  that  mighty  work  the  Great  Wall  of  China — 
raised  by  millions  of  men  in  ages  past  to  shut  off  the  delect- 
able Chinese  cities  of  the  north  from  the  savage,  looting 
hordes  dwelling  along  the  outer  fringes  of  the  old  empire. 
Though  the  Great  Wall  was  hidden  in  the  distance  it  was 
easy,  standing  here,  to  believe  in  it,  to  understand  why  it 
had  been  built  in  such  a  manner  as  to  form  among  the  chains 
of  mountains  a  complete  barrier  two  thousand  miles  long. 
It  was  unheard  of,  monstrous,  but  it  was  the  most  lasting 
expression  of  negative  power  ever  conceived — the  power 
which  would  ward  off  evil  rather  than  actively  defeat  it. 
The  Great  Wall  appeared  as  a  true  key-note  to  the  genius 
of  this  people. 

Lorenzo  had  seen  that  Peter  Kerr  was  drinking  in  this 
scene  as  he  sauntered  to  a  standstill.  So  he  waited  quietly 
until  they  were  immediately  above  the  great  entrance  to  the 
Palace.  Then,  suddenly  touching  his  companion  on  the 
shoulder,  he  wheeled  him  round. 

"Look,"  he  said  impressively,  "look  and  understand." 
It  was  indeed  a  remarkable  sight.  Immediately  below 
thundered  into  the  great  gateway-tunnel  like  a  living  torrent 
all  the  miscellaneous  traffic  of  this  immense  capital.  There 
was  one  endless  movement  of  carts,  mules,  ponies,  donkeys, 
and  camels,  now  flowing  out  of  the  city,  and  arresting  by  its 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  225 

very  violence  the  smaller  incoming  current.  Standing  above 
it  all  on  the  high  city  wall  made  the  clatter  seem  to  rise 
in  tempestuous  gusts,  as  if  this  throng  of  men  and  animals 
were  fighting  its  way  out  of  the  city,  frantically  anxious 
to  escape  some  impending  fate — hurrying,  pushing,  shouting, 
pleading. 

Yet  beyond  the  traffic,  silent,  peaceful,  almost  contempt- 
uous, was  the  great  open  space  in  front  of  the  Forbidden 
City,  enclosed  in  heavy  white  stone  railings,  and  flanked 
by  low-lying  guard-houses.  In  this  courtyard  there  was  not 
a  soul.  It  was  empty,  completely  empty.  At  the  end — per- 
haps two  hundred  yards  away — rose  the  pink-coloured  wall 
pierced  by  the  closely-shut  gates,  above  which  were  great 
roofs  of  yellow  tiling.  The  pink-coloured  wall  did  not  seem 
high,  because  of  the  vast  plan  on  which  the  foreground  was 
conceived;  nor  did  the  gates  seem  very  imposing  or  very 
formidable,  since  they  were  borne  down  by  the  mighty  pro- 
portions of  the  Tartar  Wall.  Yet  the  pink  wall  was  singu- 
larly massive;  and  the  gates,  sheathed  in  iron  and  studded 
with  iron  knobs,  seemed  supersolid.  They  were  the  so-called 
Dynastic  Gates — the  forbidden  entrance  to  the  Forbidden 
City,  through  which  no  one  may  pass  save  the  Emperor 
travelling  in  state,  or  envoys,  possessing  plenipotentiary 
powers,  on  the  day  they  present  their  credentials. 

Beyond  this  first  enclosure  the  view  became  confused.  The 
countless  green  trees  within  the  forbidden  precincts  formed 
lakes  of  green  foliage  out  of  which  rose  line  upon  line  of 
immense  yellow-tiled  roofs,  marking  how  courtyard  suc- 
ceeded courtyard  at  successive  entrance.  These  rich  yellow 
roofs  indeed  spread  away  until  they  at  last  became  lost  under 
a  distant  cone-shaped  hill  crowned  with  pavilions.  There 
were  no  minarets,  or  domes,  or  cupolas,  or  colonnades,  or 
long  fagades  of  fair  perspective  as  in  an  Indian  city  of  palaces. 
Here,  though  the  roofs  were  bathed  in  a  golden  'light  and 
their  wonderful  sepia  thrown  into  bold  relief  by  the  fierce 
reds  colouring  all  woodwork,  the  predominant  impression 
was  one  of  Chinese  squareness  mixed  with  barbaric  Tar- 


226  THE  HUMAN   COBWEB 

tar  solidity.  It  was  an  Imperial  entrenched  camp  of  brick 
and  stone  placed  in  the  very  centre  of  a  far  greater  en- 
trenched camp  made  of  the  same  materials.  It  was  the 
citadel — the  Last  Hope  of  the  Dynasty.  Its  key-note  was 
not  fairy-like  grace — but  power,  entrenched  power,  so  strong 
that  under  its  especial  protection  the  flux  of  time  had  brought 
to  its  owners  an  astounding  degeneracy. 

This  squareness,  this  rectilineal  symmetry,  followed  one 
everywhere  within  the  Forbidden  City  just  as  it  did  with- 
out. It  was  possible,  by  going  round  to  an  entrance  on  the 
eastern  or  western  flank,  to  see  that  even  within  the  For- 
bidden City  of  Palaces  itself — in  the  very  centre — was  the 
very  last  citadel  of  all,  with  a  high  crenellated  grey  wall 
surrounding  it,  below  which  ran  a  stone-faced  moat  no 
less  than  a  hundred  feet  broad.  This  inner  Palace,  enclosed 
in  this  formidable  fashion,  was,  according  to  the  map-maker, 
an  almost  perfect  square;  and  within,  protected  in  this  cun- 
ning manner,  resided  in  perpetual  peace  the  Imperial  Mas- 
ters. They  were  therefore  hidden  away  on  a  military  plan 
devised  six  or  seven  centuries  before  by  the  Mongol  con- 
queror Kublai  Khan,  who  had  only  been  content  to  exchange 
the  safety  of  his  movable  tented  camps  for  this  splendid  camp 
of  stone  and  brick  because  of  its  unconquerable  strength. 
The  sole  phantasy  which  broke  the  rectilineal  symmetry  was 
the  cone-shaped  hill.  And  this  hill  existed  for  a  most  pecu- 
liar reason.  It  was  surnamed  Coal  Hill,  and  had  been  built, 
it  was  said,  of  solid  coal  so  as  to  provide  endless  fuel  for  an 
endless  siege.  Under  the  walls  of  the  inner  citadel  were  also 
long  low-lying  granaries  always  kept  fully  stocked  with 
grain.  Artificial  lakes  within  the  Imperial  City  provided 
ample  water  to  keep  the  great"  moats  filled,  even  if  the 
outer  supplies  and  the  feeding  canals  should  be  cut  off. 
Thus  the  three  siege  essentials — water,  food,  and  fuel — were 
always  there;  and  with  these  and  the  heavy  walls  the  em- 
perors were  counted  safe. 

As  the  two  men  leaned  on  the  parapet  and  gazed,  Lorenzo 
explained  something  of  all  this  to  his  companion.  He  talked 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  227 

in  jerky,  disconnected  sentences,  helping  his  explanations 
with  the  little  map  which  he  invariably  carried  in  his  pocket. 
Nothing  of  the  wonderful  colouring  which  the  setting  sun 
was  throwing  over  the  whole  Palace,  gradually  turning 
the  roofs  to  a  glorious  dull  gold-brown;  nothing  of  the 
marvellous  clearness  of  the  hot  day,  which  made  the  sky 
one  dazzling  dome  of  audacious  blue;  nothing  of  the  calm, 
still  ocean  of  brightest  verdure  formed  of  the  leaf-hung 
trees  in  which  the  houses  of  the  plebeian  city  lay  as  if  sub- 
merged— nothing  of  these  things  attracted  the  Italian.  He 
never  even  mentioned  them  or  showed  that  he  was  con- 
scious of  their  existence.  He  was  concerned  only  with  the 
power  centred  in  the  Palace  and  what  that  power  could  do. 

"Of  course,"  he  concluded,  "it  has  really  become  fiction  that 
the  emperors  are  so  all-powerful  that  their  lightest  word 
can  make  a  desert  of  their  most  populous  province.  They 
have  shut  themselves  up  in  their  fortress  so  long  that  time 
has  defeated  them  and  they  have  really  no  strength  left. 
But  in  the  ordinary  affairs  of  life  the  fiction  is  sedulously 
kept  up — and  it  actually  works  and  works  well,  because 
it  is  necessary  for  the  life  of  the  State  that  it  should  so 
work,  and  all  admit  it.  Thus  any  little  document  marked 
with  a  stroke  of  the  Vermilion  Pencil  is  a  law  unto  itself. 
It  must  be  obeyed.  The  problem  is  to  know  what  are  really 
the  forces  which  succeed  in  extracting  that  stroke  of  the  Ver- 
milion Pencil.  If  one  could  only  know  properly,  it  might 
still  be  possible  to  do  anything — absolutely  anything — with 
the  use  of  a  good  deal  of  audacity." 

He  made  an  abrupt,  fierce  movement  with  his  hands  and 
suddenly  stopped.  Perhaps  he  did  not  want  to  be  too 
clear.  Kerr  contemplated  him  with  curious  eyes.  He 
knew  that  the  Italian's  fertile  mind  had  become  filled  with 
the  boundless  possibilities  which  the  present  times  offered, 
but  he  could  not  understand  why  he  should  have  suddenly 
become  possessed  with  this  vague  craving  to  accomplish 
more  than  it  was  safe  to  dream  of.  What  was  it?  Kerr 
wondered.  It  seemed  to  him,  after  the  many  internal 


228  THE   HUMAN    COBWEB 

and  external  complications  of  the  day,  it  was  not  only  fool- 
ish to  wish  for  difficult  things,  but  that  such  a  wish  indi- 
cated a  state  of  mind  by  no  means  healthy.  He  had  a  per- 
sonal interest  now  in  Lorenzo's  condition;  he  liked  less  and 
less  to  see  him  in  this  visionary  mood.  So  he  disagreed 
promptly. 

"It  is  all  very  well,"  he  mused  aloud,  "to  draw  these  glow- 
ing pictures  from  this  coign  of  vantage,  but  I  don't  see  what 
you  want.  It  seems  to  me  there  is  a  hard  enough  time  ahead 
with  what  we  have  on  hand  without  searching  for  more  diffi- 
cult things.  What  do  you  really  mean?" 

Lorenzo,  who  was  now  leaning  with  his  elbows  on  the  brick 
parapet,  his  hat  pushed  back,  suddenly  straightened  up.  He 
shot  a  quick  glance  at  his  companion  and  then  laughed  a  little 
bitterly. 

"What  is  the  use  of  telling?"  he  exclaimed.  "If  I  told 
you,  you  would  not  understand,  for  you  have  only  been  in 
the  country  a  few  weeks,  and  it  needs  years  to  see  really 
obvious  things  in  a  strange  land.  I,  it  is  true,  have  only  been 
here  a  year.  But  I  have  been  much  in  the  East;  and  of  my 
year  six  months  have  been  spent  in  a  lonely  province  with  no 
one  else  near  me.  I  therefore  understand,  and  understand 
properly,  that,  so  long  as  you  do  not  touch  the  bread  of  the 
common  people,  through  the  officials  and  the  Emperor  you 
can  do  anything  you  like — anything,  anything." 

He  stopped  and  pointed  a  significant  ringer  to  the  heavily- 
roofed  Palaces  spread  out  in  front  of  them,  as  if  that  was 
the  key  with  which  to  unlock  every  gate  in  this  land. 

"Well?"  said  Kerr  expectantly.  He  watched  his  compan- 
ion with  wondering  eyes.  Here  was  an  imagination  which 
eclipsed  his  as  the  mountain  eclipses  the  mole-hill. 

"Well,"  responded  the  Italian,  "the  only  thing  I  have  to 
add  is  that  if  you  made  your  plan  cleverly  enough  and  big 
enough  and  solid  enough,  it  would  be  possible  to  obtain 
sole  exploitation-rights  over  the  whole  empire — that  is,  over 
about  two  million  square  miles.  Do  you  understand?  The 
sole  rights.  It  would  beat  anything  ever  known  before, 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  229 

and  the  Americans  with  their  little  trusts  of  a  few  hundred 
millions  would  be  nowhere." 

"But  what  do  you  mean  ?"  said  Kerr,  more  than  a  little  puz- 
zled. "What  sort  of  rights?" 

"Every  kind  of  rights,"  answered  the  Italian.  "That  is, 
every  kind  that  would  not  interfere  with  the  people.  Rail- 
way and  mining  rights,  water-power  rights,  canal  rights — 
it  would  be  a  giant  exploitation  company  for  the  benefit  of 
the  Chinese  government,  doing  for  them  what  they  cannot  do 
for  themselves.  It  would  be  merely  a  question  of  arranging 
details,  once  the  principles  were  accepted." 

"You  forget  the  Foreign  Powers,"  rejoined  his  companion 
with  a  short  laugh.  "What  would  they  have  to  say  to  your 
great  scheme?" 

"Nothing,"  coolly  answered  the  other.  "They  would  have 
nothing  to  say,  absolutely  nothing — that  is,  once  the  stock 
exchanges  were  properly  interested — the  four  big  exchanges 
of  the  world.  Have  you  not  seen  yourself  how  the  Powers 
have  simply  taken  advantage  of  China's  inaction — of  the 
palsy  hanging  over  the  country?  One  sees  in  the  home 
papers  how  this  country  or  that  country  is  brilliantly  suc- 
ceeding in  China,  and  the  people  at  home  probably  imagine 
all  sorts  of  things  when  they  hear  of  these  territorial  leases 
with  little  bits  of  railway  sticking  to  them.  But  what  do 
they  really  amount  to?  Nothing.  A  Foreign  Minister 
goes  to  this  Chinese  government  with  a  memorandum  in 
his  pocket  and  harangues  the  wretched  officials  ten  times, 
or  twenty  times,  or  thirty  times,  and  beats  on  the  table  so 
much  that,  alarmed  at  his  insistence,  they  give  way,  and  re- 
port to  the  Throne  that  acquiescence  to  his  demands  has 
become  necessary.  But  what  does  a  territorial  lease  really 
amount  to?  Nothing.  It  must  wait  for  time  and  natural 
development  to  make  it  really  worth  something,  and  if  there 
were  one  great  exploitation  company  with  a  capital  of  tens 
of  millions  sterling,  such  as  I  propose,  these  concessions  given 
to  foreign  governments  could  easily  be  eaten  up  or  bought 
back  again.  It  is  individuals  with  great  sums  of 


23o  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

behind  them  that  count  to-day,  and  not  governments.  Gov- 
ernments to-day  are  not  what  they  used  to  be,  and  are  gen- 
erally only  brave  with  their  paper  memoranda,  knowing  that 
the  conclusive  argument  is — war,  which  they  fear.  China, 
if  she  were  superlatively  clever,  could  raise  a  giant  which 
would  swallow  back  at  one  meal  everything  that  is  being 
gradually  sacrificed." 

Peter  Kerr  shook  his  head. 

"The  idea  is  certainly  ingenious,"  he  said,  "but  it  is  too  big 
and  too  wonderful,  and  no  power  on  earth  could  materialize 
it  into  fact.  To  make  it  successful  you  would  require  to 
bring  representatives  of  all  the  financiers  to  Peking;  and 
once  you  did  that,  our  blessed  governments  would  be  inter- 
fering and  claiming  a  right  to  decide  how  the  spoils  should 
be  divided.  It  would  be  much  the  same  thing  as  is  going 
on,  only  in  a  different  dress.  Give  up  such  dreams,  Lorenzo, 
or  else  we  shall  have  you  turning  into  a  monomaniac." 

The  Italian  shrugged  his  shoulders  in  indifference. 

"Have  it  as  you  will,"  he  said  shortly,  resuming  his  old 
attitude.  "I  have  thought  it  over  so  long  that  I  know 
every  aspect.  This  business  could  be  managed  here  in  Peking 
without  financiers  and  without  foreign  governments.  It 
could  be  done.  However,  I  will  say  no  more." 

They  tarried  a  little  longer  on  the  imposing  Tartar  Wall 
in  the  immediate  neighbourhood  of  this  Forbidden  City, 
which  was  such  a  strange  magnet  for  the  Italian.  It  seemed, 
indeed,  to  cast  the  strongest  spell  over  him.  When  they 
finally  reached  their  little  hotel,  Kerr  found  they  had  been 
out  only  twenty  minutes  short  of  three  hours.  The  Italian 
certainly  knew  how  to  kill  time,  with  all  his  theories  and 
musings  and  dreamings. 

That  was  the  first  excursion  on  which  Lorenzo  had  taken 
Peter  Kerr.  Later  in  the  same  week  he  told  him  he  would 
like  him  to  go  again  for  a  walk,  when  he  would  show  him 
an  equally  interesting  sight.  Would  he  start  at  seven  the 
next  morning?  Kerr,  having  nothing  really  to  do,  assented 


THE    HUMAN    COBWEB  231 

readily  enough,  though  he  wondered  what  it  would  be  this 
time.  However  much  he  might  disagree  with  Lorenzo,  he 
realized  that  intercourse  with  this  subtle  and  far-seeing  man 
was  rapidly  educating  him  to  a  complete  understanding  of 
conditions  which,  had  he  been  left  to  himself,  he  would 
have  had  the  greatest  difficulty  in  grasping  alone.  The 
weeks  he  had  already  spent  in  Peking  had  to  a  great  extent 
thrown  him  out  of  his  old  bearings,  and  made  him  even  won- 
der frequently  what  relation  his  present  self  bore  to  his  for- 
mer self.  He  therefore  leaned  a  great  deal  on  Lorenzo. 
Kerr  had  been  accustomed  to  associate  all  human  activity 
with  rushing  about  and  occupying  one's  self  all  day  long  with 
endless  minutiae.  It  was  not  strange,  then,  that  these  un- 
ending days  of  waiting  tended  to  make  him  think  that  he 
was  culpably  inactive.  Generally  speaking  it  takes  an  Orien- 
tal to  understand  that  inaction  is  the  mother  of  all  action. 
Possibly  the  growing  mediocrity  of  the  West  in  all  matters 
but  the  perfection  of  purely  mechanical  contrivances  may 
really  be  largely  due  to  what  may  be  called  the  present 
patriarchy  of  action — assuming  that  there  is  such  a  thing 
as  a  matriarchy  of  inaction.  It  was  the  great  American 
philosopher  who  said  that  we  most  foolishly  call  the  poet 
inactive  merely  because  he  is  not  a  president  or  a  merchant 
or  a  porter;  it  was  he  who  also  added  so  eloquently  that 
all  institutions  are  founded  on  thoughts  and  that  consequently 
real  action  is  in  the  silent  moments — in  the  moments  when 
one  sits  brooding.  It  need  not  be  inferred  therefrom  that  a 
blissful  life  of  dolce  far  niente  is  the  only  one  fit  to  be  culti- 
vated, but  rather  that  certain  stereotyped  methods  of  activity 
are  not  necessarily  as  valuable  as  they  may  seem,  and  that 
mental  and  bodily  repose  is  very  excellent  for  all.  However 
little  Peter  Kerr  had  hitherto  troubled  his  head  about  such 
points  of  view,  they  were  now  forced  on  his  attention.  And 
as  he  was  by  no  means  a  stupid  man,  he  wondered  how  it  had 
happened  that  his  knowledge  of  the  world  had  remained  so 
small.  He  began  to  regret  acutely  his  earlier  self-sufficiency. 
Lorenzo,  on  the  other  hand,  had  an  ample  and  astonishing 


232  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

philosophy,  accustomed  to  all  possible  points  of  view  and 
willing  patiently  to  consider  and,  if  necessary,  to  put  into 
practice  at  once  the  most  novel  ideas.  He  could  spend 
entire  days  thinking  over  a  single  point — thinking,  thinking, 
thinking,  until  he  had  completely  grasped  its  every  meaning. 
It  was  for  this  reason  that  he  was  so  successful  as  a  schemer. 
If  each  time  after  his  long  sojourns  in  the  most  dissimilar 
parts  of  the  world — in  pursuit  of  his  various  schemes — he 
had  finally  returned  home  and  dissipated  much  of  his  good 
fortune  in  something  closely  resembling  riotous  living,  this 
was  because  his  mind,  having  for  the  time  being  ceased  work- 
ing, could  suggest  to  him  nothing  better  to  do  than  to  pander 
to  his  body.  And  so  he  would  fling  himself  among  the  revel- 
lers of  Paris  and  Rome  and  London  and  forget  temporarily 
that  he  had  ever  really  worked. 

Even  when  he  was  really  superlatively  active,  as  he  was  at 
present,  few  realized  it.  He  seemed  to  be  loafing — to  be 
taking  things  very  easily.  Lorenzo  was  quite  content  to  be 
busy  in  his  own  peculiar  way  until  four  or  five  o'clock  in  the 
afternoon  (he  might  be  stretched  in  a  long-chair  most  of 
the  time),  when  he  would  possibly  take  his  tennis-racket  and 
stroll  to  the  modest  little  Club,  there  to  spend  the  slow  hours 
until  dinner-time.  Whether  he  actually  played  tennis  or  not 
seemed  to  be  a  matter  of  profound  indifference  to  him;  his 
true  exercise  was  in  his  head.  It  was  not  merely  because 
he  was  inclined  to  be  fat  that  he  was  apparently  inactive; 
it  was  because  other  things  interested  him  more.  It  is  not  all 
people  who  find  happiness  in  perspiration :  some  prefer  pan- 
tology;  others  revel  in  pantophagy;  not  to  speak  of  those 
who  never  find  happiness  at  all. 

In  pursuance  of  his  plan,  punctually  at  seven  o'clock  in  the 
morning  Lorenzo  knocked  at  Kerr's  door.  The  Italian 
was  dressed  in  his  customary  manner,  in  spite  of  the  early 
hour — that  is,  with  excessive  care  and  colour.  Lorenzo's 
sartorial  efforts  were  of  the  kind  which  only  receive  full 
recognition  on  the  Riviera,  or  in  the  Cascine  of  Florence,  or 
in  other  places  of  that  sort  where  blue  skies  and  happy  cos- 


THE   HUMAN    COBWEB  233 

mopolitans  abound.  Here  they  seemed  to  be  almost  aggres- 
sively out  of  place. 

"Good-morning,"  said  he  briefly;  "are  you  ready?  If  so, 
let  us  start  and  not  talk — at  least,  not  at  first.  It  is  too  early 
to  talk.  Besides,  nobody  has  any  real  ideas  until  far  later  in 
the  day."  Lorenzo  would  have  possibly  liked  to  add  that  he 
did  not  wish  to  listen  to  anybody  in  Peking;  but  as  that 
would  have  meant  more  talk,  he  duly  refrained  from  saying 
any  such  thing. 

So  Kerr  lighted  a  cigarette,  and  said  not  a  word;  and  to- 
gether the  two  men  went  out  of  the  hotel  in  strict  silence. 

The  air  at  that  hour  was  still  fresh  and  agreeable,  for  the 
lusty  sun,  which  would  presently  blaze  down  wrathfully,  was 
as  yet  a  few  feet  above  the  eastern  city  walls  and  was  con- 
tent to  be  just  mildly  provocative.  Kerr  soon  found  that 
Lorenzo's  gait,  whatever  its  other  shortcomings,  was  pecu- 
liarly suited  to  an  Eastern  climate;  and  though  both  men 
soon  became  hot,  Lorenzo  took  care  that  they  did  not  become 
very  hot. 

Kerr's  knowledge  of  the  topography  of  the  city  was  now 
sufficient  to  inform  him  that  they  were  steadily  moving  due 
north  l>y  the  straightest  way  possible;  but  it  was  not  until 
they  had  reached  a  vastly  broad  cross-road,  and  that  the 
sun's  rays  smote  them  on  their  backs,  that  he  understood  the 
Italian's  manoeuvres.  They  were  now  going  in  the  same 
direction  as  a  great  many  people  dressed  in  official  clothes, 
all  riding  ponies  or  mules  or  driving  rapidly  in  carts;  and 
not  far  from  them  loomed  up  a  heavy  gateway  of  the  pink 
Forbidden  City. 

"But "  began  Peter  Kerr,  coming  to  a  halt,  as  he  under- 
stood where  Lorenzo  was  leading  him. 

The  Italian  stopped  him  with  a  gesture. 

"But  nothing,"  he  said.    "Wait;  wait  and  see." 

So,  pushing  their  way  through  the  growing  throng  at  a 
quicker  pace,  they  soon  came  to  the  gateway,  and  without  a 
word  Lorenzo  promptly  led  the  way  through.  There  were  a 
number  of  picturesque  if  villainous-looking  guards  lounging 


234  THE   HUMAN    COBWEB 

there;  but  to  Kerr's  surprise  they  paid  little  or  no  attention 
to  them.  Their  parti-coloured  tunics;  their  turbans;  their 
flapping  trouser-covers,  called  tiger-legs;  their  heavy,  brass- 
bound  jingals;  their  curved  swords  encased  in  green  scab- 
bards— all  these  things  recalled  the  fact  that  Peking  had 
been  even  to  the  Persians  the  City  of  Wonders,  and  that 
the  mystery  of  the  Tartar  capital  had  furnished  those  cun- 
ning story-tellers  with  materials  for  some  of  their  most 
fantastic  tales. 

Immediately  inside  this  first  gate  were  the  guard-houses. 
Romantic-looking  spears,  with  long  tassels  of  red  horsehair 
hanging  round  their  rusty  heads,  stood  ranged  in  wooden 
racks  in  front  of  the  guard-houses;  while  hanging  from  the 
walls  were  heavy  Manchu  bows  and  leather  quivers  full 
of  the  long  slim  arrows  with  which  the  conquest  of  China 
had  once  been  so  easily  effected.  There  were  also  lines  of 
sorry-looking  steeds  hitched  to  long  ropes  that  were  carried 
along  the  walls  by  means  of  heavy  iron  rings  embedded  in 
the  masonry.  These  poor  animals  might  themselves  have 
been  centuries  old,  so  forlorn  and  broken  did  they  appear. 
Assembled  in  the  manner  they  had  been  assembled  for  two 
centuries  and  more  at  the  gates  of  the  Palace,  these  military 
preparations  formed  a  vivid  illustration  of  the  decadence 
of  the  empire.  They  told  the  sad  story  of  China  during 
the  nineteenth  century  more  eloquently  than  a  hundred 
books. 

The  crowd  flowing  through  these  Imperial  gates,  and  pro- 
ceeding along  the  raised  roadway  in  a  much  narrowed  stream, 
was  not  bothered,  however,  with  any  such  thoughts.  Rudely 
pushing  and  elbowing  their  way,  they  impressed  Kerr  with 
the  idea  that  they  were  like  the  grains  of  sand  on  a  seashore, 
which  are  beyond  all  counting  and  are  yet  impelled  here 
and  there  by  the  beating  of  the  waves. 

Perhaps  it  was  because  the  two  men  were  now  within  the 
gates  of  the  Imperial  City,  and  therefore  intruders  in  a 
double  sense  in  this  yellow  world,  that  the  passers-by  now 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  235 

allowed  a  curious  enmity  to  show  itself  towards  them. 
Their  progress  was  continually  blocked — they  were  made  the 
objects  of  much  covert  insolence  and  rude  laughter.  Finally 
a  file  of  big,  bronzed  fellows  coming  from  the  opposite 
direction  suddenly  bore  straight  down  on  them;  and  as 
deliberately  as  possible,  to  the  immense  amusement  of  every 
one  who  saw  it,  the  leading  man  bumped  himself  into  Peter 
Kerr  so  hard  that  only  with  an  effort  did  he  save  himself 
from  falling. 

For  Kerr,  whose  mood  had  been  secretly  hovering  on  the 
edge  of  extreme  bad  temper  for  many  days,  this  incident 
was  sufficient  to  make  him  explode  as  a  blow  of  the  hammer 
explodes  a  case  of  explosives.  Before  any  one  had  realized 
what  was  coming,  he  recovered  himself;  and  throwing  his 
arm  round  the  man's  neck,  with  a  single  sharp  movement 
he  sent  him  flying  ignominiously  head  over  heels  down  the 
steep  embankment  of  the  roadway.  There  the  man  lay 
rolling  in  the  dust.  The  answer  to  the  challenge  given  had 
come  with  lightning  rapidity. 

Lorenzo,  who  was  a  few  steps  in  front,  had  seen  nothing 
of  this.  The  curious  quick  murmur  of  a  mob,  however, 
was  so  well  known  to  him  that,  the  very  second  he  heard  it, 
he  whirled  round,  and  in  a  flash  grasped  what  had  hap- 
pened. 

"Go  on,  go  on,"  he  urged,  quickly  thrusting  Kerr- forward, 
and  at  the  same  time  pushing  his  hands  into  his  pockets. 
Kerr  reluctantly  took  a  step  or  two,  and  then  stood  still. 
The  Italian  drew  a  silver  dollar  from  his  pocket  with  one 
hand;  the  other  hand  he  kept  under  his  coat,  but  scarcely 
far  enough  to  conceal  a  revolver.  The  fallen  man,  livid  with 
rage  though  half  subdued,  was  already  climbing  up  the  em- 
bankment. Lorenzo  approached  him  and  tendered  him  the 
dollar. 

"Yao  pu  yaof  he  said  in  his  few  words  of  useful  Chinese. 
"Will  you  have  it  or  not?" 

The  man,  sullen  yet  dominated,  stood  there  undecided. 


THE    HUMAN   COBWEB 

"Yao  pu  yao?"  repeated  Lorenzo,  this  time  with  an  ominous 
ring  in  his  voice.  Also  he  brought  his  revolver  clean  out, 
so  that  every  one  could  see  it. 

"Take  it,  take  it,"  urged  the  man's  companions  in  a  chorus, 
now  fearful  of  what  might  not  happen.     So  sullenly  the 
man  extended  his  hand,  and  no  sooner  had  his  finger  closed 
on  the  coin  than  Lorenzo  pointed  down  the  road. 
."Tso— go,"  he  said  briefly,  "go." 

Lorenzo  did  not  stir  an  inch  or  change  his  attitude  for  a 
full  half-minute,  though  a  thick  crowd  buzzed  round  him. 
At  last  convinced  that  the  man,  surrounded  by  his  com- 
panions, had  really  gone  on  and  would  not  return,  he 
rejoined  Kerr. 

"Well,"  he  said,  as  Kerr,  who  had  somewhat  cooled,  ex- 
plained to  him  how  it  had  happened,  "well,  I  can  only  ask 
you  to  be  more  careful.  You  must  remember  that  if  a  wave 
of  anger  comes,  it  may  be  a  little  like  being  caught  in  a 
tiger's  cage.  It  is  of  course  your  own  fault — but  that  is  by  the 
way.  Remember  only  that  if  the  wave  of  anger  comes  we 
will  be  like  men  in  a  tiger's  cage." 

That  is  all  Lorenzo  said  as  he  walked  on  and  brandished  a 
brilliantly-coloured  handkerchief. 

Right  in  front  of  them  there  now  loomed  up  another  mas- 
sive gateway  with  a  crenellated  grey  wall  extending  away 
on  both  sides  of  it.  There  was  a  glimpse  of  a  broad  moat 
below  the  wall,  and  there  were  guards  looking  over  the  wall, 
but  it  was  the  scene  around  the  massive  gateway  which  at- 
tracted attention  rather  than  these  things.  Separating  the 
neighbourhood  of  the  gateway  from  the  various  broad  ap- 
proaches were  very  high  wooden  palings,  painted  red  and 
furnished  with  small  wicket-gates.  Inside  these  palings,  but 
outside  the  gateway,  was  an  immense  phalanx  of  carts, 
with  hundreds  of  mules  and  ponies  picketed  beside  them. 
Dense  groups  of  official  servants  comprising  all  the  miscel- 
laneous attendants  of  Chinese  officialdom  stood  or  sat  about, 
with  their  red-tasselled  official  hats  carelessly  bestowed  on 
their  heads  or  even  carried  in  their  hands.  All  this  serving- 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  237 

world  awaited  the  return  of  the  mass  of  officials  who  had 
gone  into  the  Palace  that  dawn.  Sellers  of  sweetmeats  and 
stews  and  fruits  hawked  things  unconcernedly  through  the 
red  wooden  palings  to  these  people,  which  were  devoured 
in  hasty  mouthfuls.  The  ground  was  littered  with  the  re- 
mains of  such  impromptu  meals;  and  the  many  street-dogs, 
attracted  by  the  pleasant  odour  which  greeted  their  nostrils, 
now  cunningly  slipped  in  here  and  there,  and  snarling  and 
fighting  among  themselves,  greedily  gulped  down  every 
morsel  they  could  find.  It  was  a  rather  remarkable  early 
morning  scene. 

Lorenzo  pushed  his  way  through  the  loafing  crowd  until 
he  got  right  up  to  the  wooden  palings.  An  officious  guard 
put  out  a  sheathed  sword  to  warn  him  away,  but  the  Italian 
calmly  slipped  into  his  hand  another  one  of  those  silver 
dollars  which  he  was  so  constantly  finding  useful.  The 
soldier  thereupon  motioned  him  to  stand  so  that  no  one 
should  see  him.  Then  he  discreetly  turned  his  back.  Lo- 
renzo touched  Kerr  on  the  arm. 

"I  wish  you  to  observe  this  whole  scene  and  attempt  to 
understand  it.  If  you  can,  it  will  be  better  for  you  in  your 
business  than  years  of  residence  in  the  country.  You  see  in 
front  of  you  the  whole  manner  in  which  the  government  of 
China — that  is,  the  government  of  four  hundred  millions — 
is  carried  on.  All  the  business  of  the  empire  may  be  said 
to  flow  every  morning  through  these  gates  and  then  out 
again.  It  has  been  estimated  that  sometimes  ten  thousand 
people  go  in  and  come  out  of  the  Palace  in  a  single  day, 
and  those  thousands  are  the  links  which  connect  the  Throne 
to  the  four  hundred  millions." 

He  stopped  a  moment,  and  pulled  out  his  watch. 

"It  is  now  half-past  seven,"  he  continued,  "and  you  will 
soon  begin  to  see  a  movement.  All  the  big  business  has  long 
been  over.  It  began  at  daylight.  Soon  there  will  be  a 
surprising  procession  of  sedan-chairs  and  carts  and  riders. 
You  will  not  see  perhaps  ten  thousand  people,  unless  you 
Stay  here  all  day,  but  you  will  see  a  vast  herd — a  great 


238  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

herd,"  he  concluded,  thoughtfully  grasping  the  red  wooden 
palings  in  his  hands  and  staring  through. 

The  street-hawkers  and  the  curious,  having  finally  made 
up  their  minds  that  these  two  white  men  would  just  at 
present  do  none  of  those  surprising  things  which  made  them 
so  constantly  objects  of  open-mouthed  interest,  began  to 
break  the  close  ring  which  they  had  formed.  There  were 
constant  mutters  to  be  heard,  which  might  have  been  ex- 
pressions of  disappointment.  "What  were  these  two  foolish 
ones  looking  at  so  long?"  those  mutters  seemed  to  say. 

Peter  Kerr,  though  still  irate  from  his  encounter,  gradually 
realized,  as  he  took  in  the  scene  in  front  of  him,  that  there 
was  really  an  element  of  special  interest  here  such  as  could 
be  found  in  no  other  land.  The  great  crowd  of  waiting  men 
and  animals,  thickly  covering  a  few  acres  of  ground,  as  if 
acres  were  nothing  at  all  in  such  a  vast  empire,  could  un- 
doubtedly not  fail  to  impart  a  sense  of  bigness,  of  importance, 
of  the  complex  interests  of  countless  millions.  Also  they 
showed  clearly  to  him  the  gulf  which  had  to  be  bridged 
before  any  such  ventures  as  the  one  he  was  seeking  to 
make  successful  could  really  become  an  accomplished  fact. 
The  masses  of  ponies  and  mules,  with  their  curious  mediaeval- 
looking  saddles  and  clumsy  iron  stirrups;  the  Peking»carts, 
so  square,  so  stiff-looking,  so  unique;  the  big,  bronzed-faced 
men,  with  their  rather  absurd  hats,  their  womanish  yet  pic- 
turesque long  coats,  and  their  high  square-toed  riding-boots 
of  cloth ;  all  these  men  waiting  for  two  hours,  or  four  hours, 
or  six  hours,  or  any  length  of  time;  the  manner  in  which 
everything  was  littered  together  with  no  semblance  of  order ; 
the  vivid  colouring  which  would  have  been  audacious  and 
theatrical  out  of  Asia — every  one  of  these  things  clearly  in- 
formed him,  each  in  a  different  way,  of  the  great  gulf.  These 
things  had  at  least  been  evolved  from  the  nation's  inner  con- 
sciousness; they  were  part  and  parcel  of  a  scheme  of  society 
probably  essential  to  withstand  the  demoralizing  effect  of 
climate;  and  now  Europeans  proposed  to  upset  it  all  with 
alien  things  such  as  railways!  It  was  well  to  look  at  the 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  239 

question  from  a  purely  native  point  of  view  when  one  stood 
under  the  shadow  of  the  embattled  inner  Palace  wall  which 
sheltered  the  Son  of  Heaven  and  his  imperious  Mother. 

A  vague  stirring  and  commotion  in  the  throng  before 
them  showed  that  something  was  about  to  happen.  In  an 
indolent  way,  the  guards  assumed  a  more  military  forma- 
tion and  waved  the  hawkers  aside;  and  presently  one  of  the 
great  brass-knobbed  red  gates,  which  had  hitherto  only  stood 
ajar,  was  slowly  swung  back.  Several  men  came  out  hastily 
at  a  jog-trot;  and  at  their  summons  numbers  of  retainers 
got  up,  adjusted  their  dress  and  hats,  and  seized  their 
ponies.  Other  men  jumped  on  to  long  carts,  and  the  drivers, 
with  a  sharp  whip-cracking  and  calling,  steered  their  teams 
out  of  the  press.  Then  more  warning  shouts  came  from 
the  gates,  and  out  suddenly  swept  a  line  of  green-covered 
sedan-chairs,  each  swiftly  borne  by  four  bearers  and  accom- 
panied by  other  men  walking  beside  at  the  highest  possible 
speed  in  order  to  keep  up. 

There  were  five  or  six  of  these  chairs,  and  without  a  single 
halt  their  bearers  strode  as  fast  as  they  could  through 
the  narrow  lane  left  clear  and  then  out  of  the  wicket-gates. 
The  outriders  were  on  their  ponies  and  had  surrounded  the 
chairs  in  the  twinkling  of  an  eye,  and  no  sooner  had  the  chairs 
passed  away  than  the  lumbering  long  carts,  each  with  its 
quota  of  relay  chair-coolies  squatting  closely  together,  fol- 
lowed quickly  after  them.  In  an  ever-increasing  cloud  of 
dust  the  long  cortege  disappeared  down  the  road  Kerr  and 
Lorenzo  had  come.  It  was  over  in  a  shorter  time  than  it 
takes  to  tell. 

Lorenzo  smiled  with  satisfaction. 

"Did  you  perhaps  notice,"  he  asked,  "how  many  men  there 
were  in  all?  I  roughly  jotted  it  down  for  your  benefit.  In- 
cluding every  one,  about  one  hundred  and  twenty-two  men 
have  gone  off  with  those  people.  But  wait,  here  comes  some 
smaller  fry  attached  to  these  bigwigs." 

A  fresh  number  of  men  came  through  the  red  gates,  some 
carrying  little  bundles  done  up  in  cloth,  some  having  big 


240  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

portfolios  under  their  arms.  After  some  fresh  shouting 
more  carts  and  ponies  were  detached  from  the  mass,  and 
very  quickly  half  a  hundred  more  people  passed  away. 

Lorenzo  kept  Kerr  until  the  great  square  in  front  of  them 
was  half  emptied.  He  was  quite  right.  In  thirty  or  forty 
minutes  a  thousand  people  must  have  left,  and  the  total  dur- 
ing the  whole  day  could  not  be  much  less  than  the  reputed 
ten  thousand. 


CHAPTER  XV 

"Mais  c'est  done  une  revoke ! 
Non,    Sire,   c'est   une    revolution." 

Vie   du   Due  de  la  Rochefoucauld  Liancourt. 

IT  was  exactly  on  the  eighteenth  day  after  the  interview  with 
the  Manchu  Prince  that  the  dull  spell  was  broken.  Peter 
Kerr,  resigned  to  a  belief  in  the  inevitable  monotony  of 
things,  was  becoming  more  and  more  gloomy  owing  to  his 
enforced  inaction.  He  disbelieved  in  his  scheme;  he  dis- 
believed thoroughly  in  his  own  intelligence;  and  he  was 
also  pleased  to  disbelieve  in  humanity  generally. 

Madame  Boisragon,  with  whom  he  had  hoped  to  cultivate 
a  pleasant  acquaintance,  had  somehow  disappeared  from  his 
horizon.  She  remained  hidden  in  her  rooms,  or  if  she  went 
out  at  all  he  never  saw  her.  He  had  boldly  hoped  that 
she  would  give  him  an  opportunity  to  become  friendly  with 
her,  in  spite  of  the  hateful  little  husband  who  mysteriously 
appeared  and  disappeared  and  always  frowned  suspiciously 
on  every  one  with  consistent  impartiality,  as  if  the  world 
were  in  arms  against  him.  But  though  Kerr  had  ridden  as- 
siduously almost  every  morning  in  the  hope  of  meeting  her 
abroad,  for  some  reason  she  had  not  gone  out  excepting  on 
one  occasion — which  was  the  very  day  of  his  early  morning 
walk  with  Lorenzo.  This  added  fuel  to  the  flames  of  his 
discontent;  for  he  had  let  slip  an  opportunity  which  perhaps 
might  not  come  to  him  readily  again.  It  seemed  that  Fate 
was  bent  on  provoking  him.  He  felt  almost  vindictively 
towards  Lorenzo,  in  spite  of  the  fact  that  the  Italian  had 
been  actuated  by  the  best  of  motives  in  taking  him  abroad — 
that  is,  by  the  desire  to  educate  him  up  to  a  general  under- 
standing of  the  complicated  problem  confronting  him.  There 
are  times,  however,  when  there  can  be  too  much  educating 


242  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

and  too  little  play.  The  mental  stimulus  of  dry  facts  is 
doubtless  excellent,  but  it  is  also  somewhat  fatiguing.  Peter 
Kerr  was  becoming  frankly  tired  of  acquiring  a  knowledge 
which  was  too  full  of  the  abstract,  and  too  utterly  devoid  of 
the  concrete.  They  say  that  knowledge  is  power;  but  then, 
unfortunately,  against  this  must  be  set  the  fact  that  ignorance 
is  bliss;  and  that  most  men  prefer  bliss  to  power. 

Had  Peter  Kerr  been  destined  to  live  in  the  East  for  a 
lengthy  period  running  into  years,  he  would  have  possibly 
soon  resigned  himself  to  the  inevitable  and  attempted  to  take 
things  just  as  they  came.  But  he  had  the  uncomfortable  feel- 
ing all  the  while  that  he  was  standing  still  whilst  great 
events  were  in  the  making.  He  was  learning  much — but 
what  was  the  real  use  of  it  all?  He  felt  more  and  more 
often  that  one  day  he  would  be  reproaching  himself  for 
not  having  shown  more  foresight  and  more  energy  at  a  great 
turning-point  in  his  life.  That  is  how  he  put  it  to  himself. 

Yet  how  was  he  to  act?  He  confessed  that  he  could  not 
have  done  better  than  to  place  himself  in  Lorenzo's  hands; 
for  the  Italian,  whatever  his  faults,  was  certainly  doing  every- 
thing that  was  possible.  If  he  had  adopted  the  usual  tactics, 
and  made  himself  a  petitioner  at  the  gates  of  his  Legation, 
he  would  have  been  in  a  worse  position,  he  felt  convinced. 
The  whole  problem  was  very  tantalizing. 

So  Peter  Kerr,  irritably  biting  the  cigar  he  was  smoking, 
because  he  was  full  of  such  irritating  thoughts,  at  length 
came  down  into  the  lower  hall  of  the  hotel,  wondering  what 
to  do;  and  just  as  he  had  walked  to  the  front  door,  in 
rushed  Carnot  with  his  sun-helmet  on  the  back  of  his  head 
and  his  cadaverous  face  flushed  with  the  heat. 

"Good-morning,"  said  the  hotel-keeper,  nodding  uncere- 
moniously to  the  Englishman  in  his  usual  offhand  manner. 
"Have  you  seen  Lorenzo — Mister  Lorenzo?"  he  added,  cor- 
recting himself. 

"No,"  answered  Kerr  briefly.  Yet,  made  curious  by  the 
other's  manner,  he  continued:  "What  is  it?" 


THE   HUMAN    COBWEB  243 

"Let  us  first  find  him,"  parried  the  other,  wiping  his  fore- 
head. "Boy r  he  shouted.  "Boy!" 

Several  dim  forms  started  up  from  various  dark  hiding- 
places  and  came  silently  forward. 

"Ah,  animaux!"  Carnot  adjured  them  in  French,  "always 
tired,  always  sleepy!  Find  Monsieur  Lorenzo — quick,  do 
you  understand?  Run,  jump!" 

Roused  by  his  hurrying  tones,  they  began  disappearing  in 
various  directions,  anxious  to  placate  their  master.  But 
their  help  was  not  needed.  Lorenzo,  looking  as  if  he  had 
come  out  of  a  French  bandbox,  with  the  pinkest  of  pink 
shirts  showing  above  his  crimson  cummerbund,  and  the  most 
striking  tie  in  his  wardrobe  adorning  his  neck,  suddenly  ap- 
peared. 

"Well,"  he  said  coolly,  "you  are  making  a  great  noise.  I 
was  watching  behind  that  door  to  see  how  much  you  could 
make.  What  is  the  trouble?" 

"Ah,"  said  Carnot  with  a  look  of  relief,  dropping  his  arms, 
"there  you  are.  I  will  tell  you  over  there — come  along." 

He  led  the  way  to  his  office,  and  as  soon  as  they  were  inside 
he  closed  the  door. 

"This  is  what  I  have  for  you,"  he  said  very  seriously. 

He  threw  some  rough  printed  sheets  of  Chinese  hiero- 
glyphics on  his  desk. 

"Thanks,"  remarked  Lorenzo  ironically,  affecting  to  be 
totally  unimpressed.  "Perhaps  when  you  have  cooled  a 
little  you  will  be  good  enough  to  explain  what  may  happen 
to  be  in  those  papers.  You  may  remember  then  that,  not 
being  a  Chinaman,  I  cannot  read  Chinese." 

He  paused  and  surveyed  the  Swiss  with  his  usual  cynical 
smile.  Lorenzo  was  always  pleased  when  he  scored  in  this 
way. 

'  Heinl"  exclaimed  Carnot  with  a  peculiar  nasal  twang, 
picking  up  his  papers  again  and  waving  them  in  the  air. 
"You  do  not  know  an  Imperial  Edict  when  you  see  it? 
You  do  not " 


244  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

"Explain  yourself,"  interrupted  Lorenzo  roughly.  It 
seemed  to  Kerr  that  he  had  paled  ever  so  slightly,  though 
his  peculiar  expression  had  not  changed. 

"With  pleasure,"  replied  Carnot  with  an  important  air, 
"but  prepare  to  be  surprised.  The  Emperor,  the  young 
Emperor,  has  completely  taken  things  into  his  own  hands, 
and  is  abolishing  all  the  old  customs  and  all  the  old  women 
who  have  been  running  the  country.  Everything  old  is  to 
be  abolished  as  quickly  as  possible.  The  Edicts  are  turning 
everything  upside  down.  I  have  just  seen  my  friend  the 
eunuch,  and  he  says  never  before  has  there  been  such  a 
stir.  They  are  coming  and  going  in  and  out  of  the  Palace 
by  the  thousand.  There  will  be  trouble — of  course  there 
will  be  trouble." 

"But  the  details — the  details,"  interrupted  Lorenzo  irri- 
tably. "Spare  us  your  explanations  and  give  us  some  facts." 

For  a  moment  Carnot  looked  as  if  he  would  let  fly  a  rude 
reply:  then  he  checked  himself. 

"Well,"  he  said  gruffly.  "Primo,  the  old  woman"  (thus  it 
was  he  designated  the  illustrious  Empress  Dowager)  "is 
told  to  mind  her  own  business  and  retire.  Secondo,  a  number 
of  useless  Yamens  and  some  few  thousand  useless  officials 
are  abolished.  Terzo,  new  laws  are  promised  on  all  subjects, 
and  so  on." 

"Nothing  else?"     Lorenzo  was  smiling  amiably  now. 

"Nothing  else,"  answered  Carnot,  "but  there  is  time  for 
that  yet.  Wait  for  to-morrow  and  the  next  and  the  day 
after.  It  is  going  to  be  gay  yet,  I  promise  you." 

He  laughed  boisterously. 

Lorenzo  did  not  answer.  He  merely  resolutely  buttoned 
up  his  coat,  hiding  thereby  his  great  expanse  of  pink  shirt. 
It  was  as  if  he  were  preparing  for  a  fray  in  which  vanity  had 
no  place.  Then  he  took  up  the  papers  Carnot  had  brought 
him  and  rang  for  the  interpreters.  On  hearing  that  they 
were  in  the  hotel,  he  briefly  excused  himself.  The  hotel- 
keeper's  bombshell  had  certainly  taken  effect,  no  matter 
how  much  Lorenzo  might  try  to  laugh  it  off. 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  245 

Carnot,  for  a  few  minutes,  explained  to  Kerr  some  of  the 
probable  effects  of  these  curious  documents,  and  then  went 
away  hurriedly  again.  In  moments  like  this  he  was  always 
busy — no  one  exactly  knew  why. 

Kerr  mused  by  himself.  The  perturbation  of  the  other 
two  men  relieved  his  mood  and  made  him  more  happy.  Here, 
to  understand  politics  one  had  to  go  back  to  the  times  of  the 
seventeenth  century  in  Europe — in  France,  for  instance — 
when  the  influence  of  the  ruler's  mood  on  high  politics  was 
noticeable  at  every  turn.  The  magic  words  le  roi  sennuie, 
when  the  "sun-king"  reigned,  were  sufficient  to  cause  more 
alarm  at  Versailles  than  a  Spanish  defeat;  and  therefore  it 
should  really  be  no  surprise  that  here,  where  the  divine  right 
of  the  emperors  rested  on  the  irrefragable  evidence  of  thirty 
centuries,  the  flat  of  the  Son  of  Heaven  should  make  all 
men  tremble.  The  possibilities  were  certainly  endless. 

Yet  there  was  this  to  be  considered:  first,  the  prison-like 
nature  of  the  immensely  strong  palace  of  the  Manchus — this 
Kremlin  of  Kremlins ;  and  then,  the  strange  manner  in  which 
those  great  streams  of  officials,  flowing  in  and  out  at  an  hour 
when  the  civilized  world  had  not  yet  taken  its  breakfast, 
kept  up  sole  communication  between  the  four  hundred  mil- 
lions and  the  rulers.  Kerr  was  now  sincerely  glad  that  he 
had  gone  on  his  walks  with  Lorenzo,  for  he  realized  that 
these  two  facts  made  any  reversing  of  old-established  things 
very  dangerous  work — and  the  prospect  interested  him.  It 
was  all  very  well  for  the  Manchu  rulers  during  the  first 
years  of  the  Manchu  conquest  of  China  to  do  as  they  liked. 
Now,  however,  the  passage  of  time  and  the  enervating  influ- 
ence of  the  palaces  had  effected  the  inevitable  change,  and  the 
conquerors  of  yesterday  were  the  slaves  of  to-day.  They 
were  enslaved  by  the  Chinese  system — enslaved  by  the  divine 
right  which  was  part  of  that  system,  and  which  was  based  not 
really  on  political  but  on  religious  doctrines.  Though  the 
young  Emperor,  anxious  to  release  himself  finally  from  the 
leading-strings  of  the  old  Empress  Dowager,  might  try  to 
revive  the  traditions  of  his  illustrious  ancestors,  the  old 


246  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

armies  had  ceased  to  exist  and  now  there  was  only  paper 
and  the  Vermilion  Pencil.  It  might  be,  as  Carnot  had  ex- 
pressed it,  very  gay. 

Kerr  spent  an  hour  or  so  in  idly  discussing  the  matter 
with  various  people  in  the  hotel,  and  then  went  upstairs. 
The  servants  had  now  lowered  the  bamboo  blinds  on  the 
verandahs  to  shield  the  hotel  from  the  fierce  heat  of  the  sun. 
It  was  much  more  pleasant  here,  he  found,  than  in  the  noisy 
hall,  and  with  a  sigh  of  relief  he  sank  into  a  cane  long-chair. 

A  dozen  yards  or  so  away,  a  simple  Japanese  screen  divided 
his  portion  of  the  verandah  from  the  rest;  and  as  he  threw 
a  casual  glance  in  that  direction,  to  his  surprise  he  suddenly 
saw  through  a  narrow  gap  Madame  Boisragon.  She  had 
her  hat  on  and  was  looking  out  on  to  the  street.  She  was  also 
fanning  herself  vigorously  with  a  large  palm-leaf  fan,  as  if 
she  had  just  come  back  from  some  excursion. 

Something  prompted  Kerr  not  to  hesitate.  At  once  he 
sprang  to  his  feet  and  walked  forward. 

"Is  it  permitted  to  say  good-morning  over  the  barrier?" 
he  inquired,  coming  boldly  up  to  the  screen  and  looking 
through. 

"The  barrier  appears  no  very  solid  defence,  whether  I 
wish  it  or  not,"  commented  Madame  Boisragon  as  he 
doubled  back  a  leaf  of  the  screen. 

"Oh!"  he  exclaimed  with  disappointment  in  his  voice,  but 
with  his  hands  still  on  the  barrier. 

"No,  no,"  she  laughed,  "it  does  not  matter.  I  am  quite 
alone:  you  can  really  come  in." 

She  pushed  a  chair  towards  him,  and  at  the  same  time 
seated  herself.  On  a  rattan  table  were  some  letters  which 
she  had  just  opened.  He  was  conscious  that  there  was  a 
subtle  change  in  her,  which  he  could  not  account  for. 

"Have  you  heard  the  news?"  he  asked  as  he  took  a  seat 
and  watched  her  fan  herself. 

"The  news?"  she  said  quickly.  "What  news — what  do 
you  mean?" 


THE   HUMAN    COBWEB  247 

The  colour  stole  slowly  into  her  cheeks,  and  she  studied 
him  anxiously  with  her  grave  brown  eyes. 

"It  is  about  the  Emperor,"  said  Kerr.  "There  is  appar- 
ently a  great  fuss  going  on  in  the  Palace.  The  Emperor 
has  begun  decreeing  the  abolition  of  government  offices  and 
countless  officials  and  all  sorts  of  other  things.  People  who 
understand  these  matters  seem  generally  much  upset  and 
look  upon  it  as  the  beginning  of  many  developments." 

"What  a  nuisance,"  she  answered,  yet  speaking  in  curiously 
relieved  tones.  "There  seems  always  something  sensational 
taking  place  here;  and  the  result  is  that  we  poor  people 
have  to  wait  on  for  endless  months  twisting  our  fingers  in 
despair." 

"You  talk  as  if  you  were  a  syndicate-monger  yourself," 
laughed  Peter  Kerr. 

"I  am  nearly  related  to  the  tribe,"  she  answered  slowly. 

She  glanced  at  him  quickly  and  then  looked  away. 

"That  is  true,"  assented  Peter  Kerr,  a  little  vaguely.  Just 
then  he  remembered  what  Lorenzo  had  said  about  the  man 
Boisragon,  and  he  was  curiously  irritated. 

For  some  time  he  watched  Madame  Boisragon  thoughtfully 
picking  faded  flowers  out  of  a  little  Peking  cloisonne  jar 
which  stood  on  the  rattan  table,  whilst  he  wondered  what  she 
was  really  thinking  about. 

"It  is  very  hot,  is  it  not?"  she  said,  breaking  the  silence 
at  last.  "I  have  just  come  back  from  seeing  my  husband 
off  on  a  long  expedition.  The  streets  are  baking." 

"That  is  true,"  he  assented  readily.  Inwardly  he  was 
suddenly  excited;  outwardly  he  appeared  calm.  He  con- 
tinued: "The  mornings  are  almost  worse  than  the  after- 
noons, and  I  for  one  try  never  to  go  out  between  ten  o'clock 
and  four  o'clock." 

Madame  Boisragon  made  no  reply;  she  was  certainly  very 
busy  thinking. 

"Shall  we  have  a  lemon-squash,  or  anything  of  that  sort?" 
he  suggested  after  a  pause,  feeling  that  something  was  pre- 


248  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

venting  the  conversation  from  progressing;  and  receiving 
her  assent  he  went  off  for  a  minute. 

"Do  you  ever  feel  lonely  here?"  he  inquired  when  he  had 
returned.  He  had  made  up  his  mind  that  he  would  force 
her  to  talk.  "I  have  often  wondered.  This  hotel  certainly 
gets  on  my  nerves — it  irritates  me — it  makes  me  dissatisfied ; 
and  therefore  if  it  produces  that  effect  on  a  mere  man,  what 
must  it  not  do  in  the  case  of  a  woman." 

"One  has  to  be  philosophical  in  this  world,"  she  replied. 
"In  the  end  the  days  somehow  come  and  go  monotonously, 
and  one  can  always  console  one's  self  with  the  thought  that 
it  is  not  going  on  forever." 

1  "That  is  all  very  well,"  argued  Peter  Kerr,  wondering 
if  he  was  going  to  fail  again,  "but  still  that  is  really  the  very 
worst  of  all  doctrines — it  is  the  doctrine  of  despair." 

"Is  not  one  doctrine  as  good  as  another?"  she  inquired,  be- 
ginning to  sip  her  cold  drink  through  a  straw. 

He  dissented  with  a  vigorous  shake  of  his  head. 

"No,"  he  said  very  decidedly,  "certainly  not.  Some  peo- 
ple are  always  fortifying  themselves  with  that  point  of  view 
— that  everything  will  pass,  including  the  disagreeable  things. 
But  that  does  not  really  compensate  one  in  the  least  for 
having  to  endure  the  disagreeable  things.  The  present 
should  always  be  the  great  time — there  should  be  no  time 
like  the  time  actually  rolling  away  under  one's  feet.  Con- 
sequently your  French  proverb  is  wicked.  Tout  passe,  tout 
casse,  tout  lasse,  may  be  true,  but  the  man  or  woman  who  says 
or  acts  it  ought  really  to  be  beaten." 

"You  are  very  eloquent,"  she  answered  suddenly,  looking 
amused,  and  fanning  herself  once  more.  Perhaps  the  French 
quotation  had  appealed  to  her.  He  gained  confidence. 

"I  feel  eloquent,"  he  replied,  smiling  at  her.  "It  is  the 
first  time  I  have  enjoyed  a  talk  with  you  for  ages." 

Her  fan  stopped  for  an  instant,  as  she  watched  him  from 
under  the  broad  brim  of  her  hat. 

"Have  you  been  riding  much  lately?"  she  inquired  with 


THE   HUMAN    COBWEB  249 

unexpected  abruptness,  as  if  he  had  made  her  remember 
something  she  had  almost  forgotten. 

"Every  blessed  morning,  save  on  one  cruel  occasion." 

"Dear  me,"  she  answered,  looking  interested,  "and  that 
occasion " 

"Was  the  only  morning  you  went  out." 

Madame  Boisragon  laughed. 

"How  disappointing  that  must  have  been!" 

"It  was  far  worse :  it  was  maddening." 

She  was  still  employing  the  trick  of  looking  up  quickly 
as  he  spoke  and  then  looking  away.  But  this  time  he  was 
ready  for  her  and  their  eyes  met. 

"Won't  you  take  pity  on  me?"  he  said  suddenly  in  a  new 
way. 

Involuntarily  she  coloured  and  her  manner  became  less 
calm. 

"What  a  curious  way  to  put  it,"  she  answered  with  pre- 
tended indifference.  "You  do  not  look  in  the  least  like  a 
man  to  be  pitied.  Why  do  you  say  that?" 

He  laughed,  a  little  uncertain  what  his  answer  should  be. 

"Perhaps  to  give  you  confidence,"  he  announced  finally. 
"I  am  afraid  of  frightening  you.  You  disappear  so  easily 
in  spite  of  your  flimsy  barrier — and  think  how  cruel  that  is 
on  me." 

"How  absurd  you  always  are,"  she  objected,  nevertheless 
smiling  again. 

After  that  they  discussed  things  without  treading  on  dan- 
gerous ground;  until  the  tiffin-gong,  sounding  uproariously 
through  the  little  hotel,  warned  them  that  the  morning  had 
magically  fled. 


CHAPTER  XVI 

"II  faut  qu'une  porte  soit  ouverte  ou  fermee." 

DE  BRUEYS  ET  DE  PALAPRAT,  Le  Grandeur. 

ENTHUSIASM  is  necessary  at  every  crucial  stage  of  the  human 
game.  Your  unenthusiastic  man  is  of  small  account  in  all 
walks  of  life,  or  at  least  should  be,  since  he  will  be  inclined 
to  take  too  much  for  granted  and  will  assume  that  there  is 
too  little  to  be  gained  by  uncompromising  energy.  Enthu- 
siasm is  indeed  almost  akin  to  heroism;  for  heroism,  as  a 
great  philosopher  has  put  it,  is  the  military  attitude  of  the 
soul  enabling  one  to  cope  single-handed  with  the  infinite 
army  of  enemies.  A  man  with  no  enthusiasm  could  not 
possibly  do  that. 

It  had  not  escaped  Lorenzo's  notice  that  Kerr  had  begun 
to  act  lately  in  a  much  bored  and  tired  way,  as  if  he  were 
becoming  sated  with  this  worrying  and  plotting  and  plan- 
ning— as  if  he  would  gladly  give  it  all  up. 

It  therefore  speedily  aroused  his  curiosity  when  that  same 
evening  Kerr  came  down  to  dinner  a  considerably  changed 
man.  Kerr  seemed  interested  in  all  the  Italian  told  him 
regarding  the  import  of  the  sensational  Imperial  Decrees 
of  the  morning;  he  made  a  number  of  good  suggestions  as 
to  what  steps  they  should  try  and  take  together  to  safeguard 
their  interests,  and  altogether  his  energy  seemed  revived 
and  stimulated. 

After  he  had  said  good-night  Lorenzo  sat  a  long  while  alone 
thinking  the  matter  over.  For  the  life  of  him  he  could 
not  imagine  what  the  solution  was ;  and  to  help  himself  solve 
the  problem  he  finally  lit  a  very  long,  thin,  black  Italian 
cigar  that  goes  by  the  name  of  Virginia.  Lorenzo  believed 
greatly  in  examining  a  problem  carefully  in  all  its  bear- 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  251 

% 

ings,  since  one  always  comes  across  something  of  value  after 
a  spell  of  patient  thought. 

The  biting  fumes  of  the  strong  cigar  between  his  teeth  must 
have  been  oddly  stimulating  to  him;  for  almost  immediately 
after  he  had  ceased  paying  attention  to  his  weed  and  sat 
entirely  engrossed  in  his  thoughts,  he  gave  vent  to  a  great 
oath.  He  then  began  laughing  so  loudly  to  himself  that 
the  dining-room  boySj  dozing  behind  screens,  started  up 
alarmed,  thinking  him  perhaps  gone  mad.  One  never  quite 
knew  with  these  outlanders,  their  manner  seemed  to  say; 
foreigners  were  subject  to  all  sorts  of  fits.  What  was  the 
matter  with  this  one? 

As  he  sat  there  with  his  head  thrown  back  and  his  black 
beard  sticking  straight  out,  Lorenzo  indeed  looked  like  a 
veritable  Mephistopheles — a  Mephistopheles,  it  is  true,  who 
has  become  somewhat  fat  through  good  living,  but  who  still 
remains  a  Mephistopheles. 

"What  a  fool !"  he  murmured  to  himself  softly  in  Italian,  as 
soon  as  he  had  recovered  somewhat.  "What  a  fool!"  he  re- 
peated, yet  speaking  with  curious  satisfaction.  "What  a 
fool!" 

Then  a  new  thought  struck  him.  At  once  he  stopped  laugh- 
ing and  his  features  stiffened. 

He  must  have  made  up  his  mind  very  quickly,  for,  with 
a  new  look,  he  instructed  a  servant  to  go  and  find  his  master 
at  once.  The  blue-coated  boy  whisked  noiselessly  away,  the 
grey  cigar-smoke  whirling  out  of  the  hot  dining-room  behind 
him  in  a  vortex. 

Garnot  was  not  long  in  coming.  When  he  was  not  out 
of  the  hotel  he  was  always  working,  and  when  he  worked  he 
was  not  hard  to  find.  His  rough,  bragging  voice  was  gen- 
erally well  raised  in  some  distant  part  of  the  hotel,  cursing 
or  joking  with  his  servants.  Carnot  was  a  strange  enough 
mortal,  with  a  great  gift  for  doing  exactly  as  he  felt  like 
doing. 

Now  he  strolled  carelessly  into  the  dining-room,  pulling 


252  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

on  a  white  duck  jacket  as  he  walked  and  smoothing  out  his 
hair. 

"Eh  bien,  quest-ce  quil  aT*  he  began  in  his  Swiss  French 
with  all  his  odd  familiarity. 

"Sit  down,"  answered  Lorenzo  in  the  same  language,  with 
his  rolling  Italian  accent.  Then,  before  saying  anything  fur- 
ther, he  offered  him  a  glass  of  cognac. 

Carnot  drained  the  little  glass  after  the  manner  of  the 
expert — that  is,  at  one  draught — setting  it  down  with  a 
thump  which  was  accompanied  by  a  sigh  of  satisfaction. 

"Eh  bien/'  he  repeated  more  lazily,  leaning  his  elbows  on 
the  table  and  looking  at  Lorenzo  inquiringly.  They  had 
the  dining-room  entirely  to  themselves,  for  the  servants 
had  cunningly  slipped  away,  fearing  that  if  anything  was 
said  which  might  anger  their  master  he  would  first  vent 
his  wrath  on  them.  That  was  a  very  old  trick,  which  he 
often  employed. 

"About  this  man  Boisragon,  what  do  you  really  know  of 
him?"  began  Lorenzo  abruptly,  looking  keenly  across  the 
table  with  his  bright  eyes. 

"Oh,"  said  Carnot  indifferently,  "I  only  know  what  you 
know,  which  is  practically  the  same  as  saying  nothing.  He 
comes,  he  goes,  he  eats,  he  sleeps — and,  I  am  pleased  to  say, 
his  bills  are  paid  most  regularly." 

Lorenzo  interrupted  him  with  an  irritable  gesture. 

"Save  yourself  the  trouble  of  telling  me  those  things," 
he  said  coldly.  "I  am  not  asking  you  questions  to  amuse 
myself.  I  wish  to  learn  something  interesting  and  valuable. 
For  instance,  for  how  long  has  he  gone  away  just  now,  where 
has  he  gone  to,  what  is  his  object  in  going?" 

"You  do  not  want  to  know  much,"  replied  the  cadaverous 
innkeeper  ironically.  He  made  as  if  he  had  no  intention  of 
being  obliging — yet  he  accepted  with  alacrity  the  second  little 
glass  which  Lorenzo  poured  out  for  him.  He  tossed  the 
contents  down  his  throat  like  a  trooper  and  then  slowly 
crossed  his  arms  on  the  table.  For  a  while  he  was  appar- 
ently much  occupied  in  thinking. 


THE   HUMAN    COBWEB  253 

"Well,  since  I  have  found  out  all  these  things,"  he  said 
finally,  "there  is  no  real  reason  why  I  should  not  tell  you — 
if  it  is  of  importance.  He  will  be  away  about  a  month — at 
least  a  month,  I  should  say.  He  has  gone  to  the  Yang-tse 
overland,  and  his  object  is  to  secure  the  preliminary  con- 
tract for  some  railways  down  there.  And  what  is  more,  I 
believe  this  time  he  will  succeed.  There  you  have  it." 

If  Carnot  had  expected  that  the  Italian  would  show  sur- 
prise he  was  disappointed.  Lorenzo  only  smiled  a  little  mys- 
teriously, and  began  sharpening  a  pencil  with  an  elaborate 
penknife  which  he  had  taken  from  his  pocket. 

"Why  will  he  succeed?"  he  asked  when  he  had  finished 
his  pencil. 

"Why?"  echoed  Carnot.  "For  the  best  of  reasons,  par- 
bleu!  Because  he  is  now  properly  supported  by  two  gov- 
ernments, and  possibly  by  three." 

"Ah!"  said  Lorenzo  sharply. 

This  time  he  was  aroused  and  did  not  conceal  it. 

"Who  told  you  that — how  did  you  find  it  out?"  he  con- 
tinued. 

"The  way  I  find  everything  out— by  listening  and  picking 
up  threads." 

"Still,"  persisted  the  Italian,  "you  could  not  state  what 
you  have  stated  without  good  authority.  What  is  your  au- 
thority ?" 

Carnot  looked  almost  suspiciously  across  the  table,  and  at 
the  same  time  he  frowned. 

"Come,  come,"  he  began  once  more  in  his  rough  grumbling 
voice.  "I  don't  mind  telling  what  I  know,  but  to  play  the 

juge  d' instruction  is  a  bit  stiff.  Besides "  He  paused 

and  looked  openly  aggrieved. 

Lorenzo  laughed  softly  as  a  woman  might  have  done. 
There  was  nothing  jarring  at  all  in  his  laugh.  It  was  as  if 
a  child  had  to  be  humoured  and  soothed;  and  to  give  point 
to  it,  he  reached  over  the  table  with  his  long  bottle  of  brandy 
and  filled  Carnot's  glass  for  the  third  time,  so  full  that  the 
spirit  lapped  over  the  brim. 


254  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

"My  dear  fellow,"  he  said  very  quietly,  "never  begin  to 
feel  angry  until  you  have  just  cause.  I  will  now  be  quite 
frank  with  you.  I  wish  to  know  these  things  because  they 
intimately  affect  the  Englishman  Kerr  and  myself;  and 
also  because  they  may  affect  the  length  of  our  stay  in  your 
delightful  hotel.  Tell  me  now  how  you  found  out  about  this 
government  support." 

This  time  Carnot  did  not  drink  off  the  little  glass  at  one 
draught.  He  amused  himself  sipping  it  slowly,  and  with  a 
few  last  drops  still  in  the  bottom  of  the  glass,  he  sat  there 
with  his  head  thrown  back  and  his  eyes  on  the  ceiling.  His 
sallow  face  had  become  somewhat  flushed,  and  his  eyes 
glittered  in  a  curious  way. 

"Well,  I  will  tell  you,"  he  said  at  last.  "It  comes  from 
the  chancellery  of  my  Legation." 

"Ah!"  said  Lorenzo,  immediately  relapsing  into  silence. 
His  subtle  mind  recognized  the  ring  of  truth  in  that  state- 
ment. He  knew,  of  course,  that  Carnot  would  just  as  soon 
have  lied  to  him  as  not.  But  Lorenzo  also  knew  what  very 
few  men  know — that  truths  really  worth  knowing  are  had 
almost  as  often  from  persons  who  habitually  prevaricate 
as  from  so-called  truthful  people.  One  of  the  greatest  tal- 
ents is  to  be  able  to  distinguish  the  grain  from  the  chaff. 

He  reflected  for  a  long  time  on  what  he  had  heard  and 
seemed  quite  satisfied. 

"Thank  you,  mon  ami''  he  said  sincerely  at  last.  "What 
you  have  told  me  is  of  great  service." 

Carnot  got  up. 

"I  suppose,"  remarked  Lorenzo  carelessly,  "that  Madame 
Boisragon  will  remain  here  all  the  time  that  her  husband 
is  absent?" 

"I  suppose  so,"  said  Carnot,  pausing  with  his  hands  on  the 
back  of  his  chair. 

"Has   there   ever   been "      Lorenzo   stopped   suddenly 

and  looked  at  Carnot  with  a  queer  smile. 

Carnot  understood  him  at  once. 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  255 

"Ah,  no,"  he  said  emphatically,  "never." 

I/orenzo  got  up  and  put  the  pencil  which  he  had  so  busily 
sharpened  carefully  away  in  his  pocket.  Then  he  held  out 
his  hand. 

"Good-night,"  he  said,  "and  thank  you  again." 

Without  another  word  he  walked  off  to  his  room  with  his 
quick,  short  steps.  He  had  got  the  solution,  he  was 
sure.  .  .  . 

Upstairs  Peter  Kerr  was  whistling  softly  to  himself.  It 
was  plain  that  his  good  spirits  had  in  no  wise  abated.  Had 
he  guessed  how  Lorenzo  had  been  spending  the  latter  part 
of  the  evening,  he  might  have  been  less  happy.  Fortunately 
one  is  spared  from  knowing  all  that  might  be  good  for  one 
to  know;  and  Kerr,  blissful  in  his  ignorance  that  a  subtle 
mind  was  preparing  to  watch  him  very  closely,  continued 
to  whistle  and  hum  to  himself. 

Once  Peter  Kerr's  mind  turned  indeed  for  an  instant  to 
Lorenzo,  and  he  wondered  what  new  measures  he  would 
take  in  the  face  of  the  new  developments  which  had  come. 
Lorenzo  would  rise  to  the  occasion,  he  had  no  doubt. 

And  just  then  Peter  Kerr  blew  out  his  light. 

A  hotel  is  curiously  like  a  box,  full  of  different  compart- 
ments, each  containing  different  kinds  of  insects,  engaged  in 
their  own  special  antics.  Separated  only  by  lath  and  plaster, 
some  are  doing  one  thing,  some  another  thing,  and  some 
nothing  at  all.  Imagine  how  amusing  it  would  be  if  one 
could  get  a  simultaneous  view  of  these  manifold  activities! 

Not  more  than  forty  or  fifty  feet  from  Kerr  Madame  Bois- 
ragon  was  reclining  and  turning  over  the  leaves  of  a  French 
novel  under  the  pretence  of  reading.  As  a  matter  of  fact  she 
was  much  more  busy  thinking  than  reading,  and  once  or 
twice  so  intent  were  her  thoughts  that  the  paper-covered 
novel  almost  fell  from  her  hand. 

Now  the  cruel  dictum  of  one  Publius  Syrus  that  a  woman 
who  thinks  alone  thinks  of  mischief,  is  certainly  as  untrue  as 


256  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

every  other  sweeping  statement.  But  still,  look  what  La 
Fontaine  said  in  the  fable  of  the  woman  turned  into  a 
cat!  Nature,  sang  the  French  story-teller,  is  such  that 

Jamais  vous  n'en  serez  les  maitres, 
Qu'on  lui  ferme  la  porte  au  nez, 
II  reviendra  par  la  fenetre. 

It  so  happened  that  through  her  open  windows  Madame 
Boisragon  could  see  the  stars  glittering  in  a  sky  of  sombre 
blue.  There  was  infinite  poetry  in  the  street-cries  which 
floated  on  the  still,  dry  air. 

Their  strange  cadences,  their  sudden  pauses  and  breaks, 
seemed  full  of  mystery,  of  vague  hopes  and  fears. 

During  the  day  she  had  had  three  separate  conversations 
with  Peter  Kerr,  each  one  longer  than  the  last. 

Perhaps  that  was  why  now  she  felt  so  very  much 
alone. 


CHAPTER  XVII 

"Raisonner  sur  1'amour,  c'est  perdre  la  raison." 

BOUFFLERS,  Le  Cceur. 

"I  LOVE  them  because  they  are  so  solemn  and  satisfied.  Noth- 
ing ever  changes  them.  Are  they  not  strange?" 

Madame  Boisragon,  as  she  said  this,  put  one  arm  caress- 
ingly round  the  neck  of  the  fat  stone  horse  against  which 
she  was  leaning  and  patted  him  as  if  he  had  been  quite 
real.  She  included  in  that  caressing  gesture  the  whole  strange 
family  of  stone  men  and  animals  that  lined  the  little  avenue 
leading  up  to  the  tomb  of  a  princess  who  had  long  been  dust. 
A  river  ran  lazily  between  banks  of  high  green  reeds  at  the 
end  of  the  avenue;  and  a  stone  landing-stage,  once  beautiful 
but  now  sadly  broken  and  dilapidated,  showed  how  mourners 
used  to  come  hither  ceremoniously  by  boat  and  burn  their 
incense  and  pray  their  prayers  at  the  tomb.  There  were 
also  little  marble  arches,  carved  with  dragons,  leading  the 
way  up  hither.  These  added  to  the  picturesqueness  of  a  site 
thickly  shaded  with  old  trees  and  guarded  by  heavy  flanking 
walls  now  full  of  breaches,  out  of  which  grew  shrubs  and 
even  willows. 

All  the  statues  and  the  animals  ranged  along  this  little 
avenue  were  enchanting  because  of  their  naivete  of  posture 
and  their  immense  squareness.  First,  in  the  most  important 
place,  stood  two  men.  One  was  a  massive  warrior  clad 
in  a  coat  of  mail,  with  his  thick  legs  encased  in  buskins  and 
with  a  helmet  of  a  very  ancient  type  on  his  head.  He  was 
also  the  possessor  of  a  very  square  sword,  which  added  to 
his  grotesque  fierceness.  Immediately  opposite  him  was  a 
civil  official,  a  bureaucrat  of  bureaucrats,  clad  in  the  almost 
womanlike  Chinese  robes  of  office.  But  as  he  belonged  to 
the  old  heroic  age,  his  costume  had  something  of  the  flowing 


258  THE  HUMAN  COBWEB 

grace  of  the  early  dynasties  and  not  so  much  of  the  stiffness 
and  neatness  of  the  later  Tartar  garb.  He  belonged  un- 
deniably to  the  days  when  a  rebellion  might  have  been  sub- 
dued by  an  apt  quotation  from  the  classics. 

After  these  two  figures  came  the  great  stiff-looking  stone 
horses  with  their  elephantine  legs  terminating  in  impossible 
hoofs,  and  their  good-natured  clumsy  heads  reflecting  dis- 
tress at  their  unchangeable  fate.  Everything  was  correctly 
curved  on  them — high  saddles,  heavy  bridles,  and  quaint 
stirrups.  A  naked  little  boy,  playing  blissfully  in  the  dirt, 
and  occasionally  digging  up  worms  with  his  nimble  fingers, 
explained  by  means  of  gestures  that  one  steed  belonged  to 
the  warrior  and  the  other  to  the  civil  official.  Each  had  his 
horse  always  ready  to  be  mounted.  Farther  down  the  avenue, 
also  ranged  in  pairs,  were  wise-looking  tigers  and  leopards 
and  other  giant  cats.  As  they  squatted  there  comfortably  on 
their  haunches,  they  seemed  almost  to  be  waiting  to  be  fed. 
The  little  naked  boy  appeared  at  first  in  some  doubt  as  to 
why  they  were  there,  and  shook  his  head  at  Kerr.  Then, 
evidently  remembering  a  half-forgotten  solution,  he  ran  quick- 
ly to  the  warrior  and  the  civil  official  and  with  a  rapid 
pantomime  showed  that  in  case  of  necessity  both  would 
mount  their  horses  and  drive  away  from  the  sleeping  prin- 
cess all  such  marauding  beasts  as  tigers  and  leopards  and 
panthers. 

"The  problem  is  now  fully  explained,"  said  Peter  Kerr 
with  a  laugh.  "Your  fat  and  satisfied  men  could  appar- 
ently be  defiant  and  dangerous.  Nobody  shall  hurt  the 
princess,  is  evidently  their  motto.  They  are  the  guardians 
of  the  tomb." 

He  walked  across  to  the  other  stone  horse  and  with  an 
effort  vaulted  into  the  high-peaked  stone  saddle. 

"They  are  comfortable  steeds,"  he  remarked.  The  little 
boy  with  wistful  playfulness  put  up  a  dirty  hand  and  seized 
the  stone  bridle.  He  would  hold  the  horse  to  keep  him 
quiet ;  and  so  like  that  he  stood,  no  more  noticed  by  the  two 
than  had  he  been  a  fly. 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  259 

On  the  other  side  Madame  Boisragon  remained  in  the  same 
attitude  plunged  in  thought.  Her  big  Terai  hat,  turned 
up  behind  and  pinned  down  in  front,  hid  her  eyes;  but  Kerr 
understood  from  the  expression  on  her  lips  that  her  thoughts 
had  gone  far  away.  He  watched  her  curiously:  against  the 
great  squat  horse  she  made  a  suggestive  figure.  The  dense 
groves  of  trees  kept  away  the  golden  sunlight  which  was 
flooding  and  scorching  the  country  through  which  they  had 
just  ridden;  and  the  light  which  filtered  through  the  branches 
left  the  stone  walk  in  a  curious  chiaroscuro,  restful,  peace- 
ful, and  full  of  fancy.  Kerr  did  not  wonder  that  she  did  not 
speak. 

Where  the  trees  thinned  away  at  the  end  of  the  avenue,  the 
sunlight  was  pouring  down  so  intensely  that  out  in  the  full 
glare  even  the  drab-coloured  waters  of  the  little  river  flashed 
and  sparkled.  The  tumbled  masonry  and  the  dilapidated 
stone  arches,  their  defects  hidden  in  the  distance,  completed 
a  charming  vista.  Sometimes  a  barge  full  of  people  would 
pass  slowly  along  the  river  and  remain  in  view  for  a  few 
seconds  through  the  narrow  opening  of  the  trees  as  the  sweat- 
ing trackers  stamped  their  way  along.  Then  the  brilliant 
colouring  of  the  Manchu  women's  dresses  would  mingle 
with  the  brown  backs  of  men  who  sat  half-stripped  on  the 
gunwales  vigorously  fanning  themselves.  It  was  like  a  piece 
of  old  Chinese  pottery. 

For  on  the  farther  bank  of  the  river,  beyond  the  great  reeds 
of  luscious  green  which  looked  so  cool,  was  a  red-walled 
temple,  standing  high  up,  and  breaking  the  dazzling  blue 
of  the  sky-line.  It  seemed  as  if  all  the  colours  in  the  world 
were  out  sunning  themselves  that  day — not  timid,  washed- 
out  colours,  but  brilliant,  bold,  splendid  colours,  such  as  are 
treasured  up  for  all  time  in  paintings  and  porcelains.  The 
air  was  also  full  of  the  sounds  of  the  fast-coming  Chinese 
summer.  Cicadas  sung  wee,  wee,  wee,  in  long,  slow  content- 
ment, drawing  out  their  notes  indefinitely  and  filling  the 
groves  with  their  sounds.  Big  gauzelike  dragon-flies,  drawn 
from  the  river-banks  by  the  promised  shade  and  cool  of  the 


260  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

trees,  whisked  suddenly  to  and  fro  in  swarms.  From  the 
red-walled  temple  a  flight  of  pigeons  had  just  been  unloosed 
and  were  now  flying  high  in  the  skies  to  the  musical  whirring 
of  the  wooden  whistles  set  under  their  wings.  It  was  a  won- 
derful day. 

Madame  Boisragon  at  length  gave  vent  to  a  long  sigh  and 
withdrew  her  arm  from  the  stone  horse. 

"Good  old  horse,"  she  murmured  with  a  final  pat,  as  if 
she  had  been  thinking  of  him  all  the  while.  She  came 
forward,  playing  with  her  whip,  which  she  bent  almost  in 
two  between  her  hands. 

"It  is  beautiful  to-day,"  she  said  reflectively.  "There  is  a 
curious  poetry  in  the  country  around  the  old  capital  just  now. 
It  is  a  little  Persian,  a  little  Arabian,  yet  it  is  neither  of  the 
two.  I  wonder  what  it  is." 

She  was  standing  right  beside  Kerr  now;  he  slid  to  the 
ground  before  answering  her. 

"I  am  afraid  I  am  not  clever  enough  to  find  the  right 
name,"  he  said,  "I  can  only  illustrate  it.  Look!" 

A  barge  had  floated  into  the  very  middle  of  their  narrow 
view  of  the  river.  Bathed  in  the  dazzling  sunlight,  it  looked, 
from  the  deep  shade  in  which  they  were  standing,  almost 
unreal.  A  crowd  of  brilliantly-dressed  Manchu  women 
were  sitting  in  groups  or  standing  holding  on  the  awning; 
and  some  youths,  to  entertain  them,  were  playing  native 
guitars  and  singing  in  a  curious  falsetto.  For  one  instant  the 
barge  remained  in  full  view;  then,  very  gradually  and  very 
gently,  it  floated  away. 

"It  is  delightful,"  murmured  Madame  Boisragon.  "It  re- 
minds me  of  a  story  I  heard  the  other  day." 

She  walked  back  a  little  and  sat  down  on  some  stone  steps. 

"What  is  the  story?"  Kerr  inquired,  curious  to  hear  her 
tell  it. 

"It  is  nothing  much,"  she  answered.  "I  do  not  know  even 

if  I  can  tell  it.  However "  She  folded  her  hands  and 

began : 

"There  was  once  an  Emperor  who  wished  to  marry   the 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  261 

daughter  of  a  Mohammedan  monarch  in  Central  Asia,  so  that 
he  might  extend  his  empire  and  also  have  an  ally  who  would 
help  him  in  case  of  rebellion.  So  he  sent  his  ambassadors 
with  presents  to  all  the  courts  of  the  Khans  to  find  a  maiden 
who  must  be  not  only  beautiful  but  the  daughter  of  a  power- 
ful Prince  as  well.  After  some  search  the  ambassadors  found 
a  suitable  bride,  and  thereupon  they  presented  their  gifts 
and  begged  for  the  maiden's  hand.  Of  course  that  was 
easily  arranged,  for  the  Emperor  of  China  has  always  been 
a  most  desirable  parti. 

"But  after  the  bride  had  set  out  on  her  long  journey,  across 
the  thousands  of  miles  of  wastes,  she  became  very  sad,  and 
by  the  time  she  arrived  in  Peking  she  was  quite  inconsolable. 
The  Emperor,  having  promptly  married  her,  soon  noticed  her 
condition. 

"'What  is  it  you  want?'  he  cried.  'Ask  for  anything  and 
it  shall  be  given  to  you.' 

"  'You  are  very  good,'  the  Princess  replied.  'It  is  true 
that  I  am  homesick.  I  think  I  would  love  a  mosque  with 
minarets  and  towers  as  in  my  own  country,  built  where  I 
can  see  it  all  day  long.  Perhaps  that  will  comfort  me.' 

"The  Emperor  promptly  set  his  most  skilled  workmen  to 
work,  and  just  outside  the  Palace  a  beautiful  mosque  was 
soon  raised,  and  priests  were  brought  from  the  country  of  the 
Princess  to  pray  in  her  own  language.  And  so  that  the  Prin- 
cess should  be  quite  near,  a  great  red  pavilion  with  latticed 
windows  was  built  overlooking  the  Palace  Walls,  and  there 
she  sat  all  day  long. 

"The  story  ends  rather  lamely,  I  am  afraid.  The  Princess, 
in  spite  of  the  mosque,  soon  died,  and  her  son,  I  believe,  died 
soon  afterwards,  but  at  least  you  are  shown  the  mosque  and 
pavilion  to-day,  so  the  story  is  approximately  true." 

"It  is  a  poetic  little  story,"  said  Peter  Kerr  when  she  had 
finished,  "and  yet  it  does  not  say  much  for  the  life-preserving 
qualities  of  love.  In  the  arms  of  the  Emperor  the  Princess 
should  have  forgotten  everything,  and  lived  happy  ever 
afterwards.'1 


262  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

"Perhaps  she  was  not  at  all  in  love,"  objected  Madame 
Boisragon.  "Very  probably  the  Emperor  was  old  and  ugly 
— and  she  was  merely  a  new  plaything." 

"Still,"  persisted  Kerr,  because  he  loved  to  argue  with 
Madame  Boisragon  and  startle  her  with  unconventional 
ideas,  "love  is  not  dependent  on  age." 

"I  never  said  it  was,"  she  replied. 

"But  you  said  the  Emperor  was  probably  old  and  ugly," 
he  objected,  "which  is  much  the  same  thing." 

She  shrugged  her  shoulders. 

"A  Chinese  Emperor  has  very  different  ideas  from  ours." 

He  shot  a  look  at  her  to  see  whether  she  was  going  to 
continue,  and  saw  that  she  was  not.  So  he  went  on. 

"One  wonders  sometimes  whether  these  people  are  really 
wrong  or  right  in  their  ideas,"  he  soliloquized,  apparently 
watching  the  frantic  but  ineffective  efforts  of  the  naked  little 
boy  to  clamber  up  one  of  the  stone  horses.  He  was  making 
mad  leaps,  which  were  hopelessly  ineffective. 

"What  ideas?"  inquired  Madame  Boisragon.  She  was 
watching  these  antics  too. 

"Well,"  began  Peter  Kerr,  "they  are  so  matter-of-fact  re- 
garding women.  If  a  man  wants  more  than  one  wife,  he 
takes  her,  and  all  is  done  so  regularly  and  so  seriously  that 
there  can  really  be  no  question  of  vice.  Generally,  I  am 
told,  the  several  wives  are  the  best  friends  in  the  world  and 
entertain  one  another  admirably.  The  Mormons  tried  the 
experiment  so  as  to  be  able  to  people  a  wilderness,  but  uni- 
versal rage  soon  destroyed  them.  Asiatics,  without  any 
such  utilitarian  thoughts  as  the  Mormons,  have  been  prac- 
tising the  tenets  of  Brigham  Young  since  the  beginning  of 
time,  and  yet  nothing  disastrous  has  happened  to  them.  So 
it  cannot  be  inherently  vicious;  it  must  be  merely  prejudice 
which  makes  us  condemn  the  system." 

"I  think  the  idea  is  awful,"  protested  Madame  Boisragon, 
in  a  way  which  suggested  she  had  never  thought  about  it 
before. 


THE   HUMAN    COBWEB  263 

Peter  Kerr  laughed.  Somehow  it  always  afforded  him  ex- 
quisite pleasure  to  try  and  shock  her. 

"That  is  all  very  well,"  he  resumed,  "but  that  is  no  argu- 
ment. Monogamy  can  hardly  be  natural  if  it  is  only  prac- 
tised by  about  a  third  of  mankind.  That  is  unanswerable,  it 
seems  to  me.  In  Asia,  in  Africa,  and  in  the  Pacific,  polyg- 
amy is  the  natural  state  and  a  man  gets  as  many  wives  as  he 
likes.  Periodically  he  replenishes  his  stock  when  he  can 
afford  to  do  so.  It  must  be  a  charming  existence — for  those 
who  can  afford  it!  Most  men,  however,  can  only  keep  one 
wife;  a  great  many  men  can  afford  no  wife  at  all  where  the 
struggle  for  existence  is  frantic;  and  so  the  thing  adjusts 
itself  as  far  as  numbers  are  concerned.  Now  if  this  were  not 
a  natural  condition — if  this  were  violating  nature's  laws — 
it  could  not  possibly  exist  without  bringing  its  own  pun- 
ishment. Yet  look  at  this  country.  It  is  four  thousand 
years  old  and  has  four  hundred  millions  of  people.  It  is 
absurd  to  pretend  that  it  is  immoral." 

Madame  Boisragon  remained  unconvinced. 

"It  is  founded  on  a  system  which  can  only  be  bad,"  she 
said.  "Why,  may  I  ask,  should  a  man  have  two  wives  any 
more  than  a  woman  two  husbands?" 

"That  is  again  no  answer,"  he  cried,  laughing  at  her.  "I 
want  to  know  why  it  is  bad — why  it  is  immoral." 

"It  is  against  Christianity,"  she  replied,  as  if  she  did  not 
know  what  to  say. 

"I  knew  that  was  coming,"  cried  Peter  Kerr  triumphantly. 
"That  is  the  argument  of  children  and  women.  But  are  you 
sure  you  are  really  right  ?  The  Jews  were  tremendous  polyg- 
amists:  why  should  the  Christians  have  suddenly  changed  it 
all?  The  change,  I  believe,  is  justified  by  a  few  doubtful 
words  in  the  New  Testament.  Politics — Church  politics — 
had  much  more  to  do  with  it  than  any  natural  or  moral  laws. 
Marriage  by  the  Church  only  took  place  long  after  Europe 
had  become  Christian.  Until  the  Church  took  things  into  its 
hands  men  were  polygamous,  but  after  that  the  priests  were 


264  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

clever  enough  to  see  that  if  they  got  the  women  on  their  side, 
they  would  be  the  absolute  masters " 

"But  where  does  all  that  lead  you  to?"  interrupted  Madame 
Boisragon.  "You  cannot  set  aside  well-established  customs 
and  take  two  or  three  wives.  I  should  like  to  see  you  try  it." 

"Monogamy  is  an  artificial  state,"  replied  Peter  Kerr  ob- 
stinately. "It  is  not  natural  and  never  can  be.  And  it  is 
probably  one  of  the  real  reasons  why  our  civilization  has 
become  more  artificial  than  any  other  in  the  world.  We 
have  to  keep  up  a  huge  pretence  about  a  really  vital  matter — 
and  the  result  is  bad." 

"Still,"  persisted  Madame  Boisragon,  "admitting  all  you 
say  is  correct,  how  are  matters  to  be  bettered?  How  can 
you  now  reconstruct  European  society?  It  is  impossible." 

"It  is  not  impossible,"  rejoined  Peter  Kerr,  now  quite  seri- 
ous. "The  old  system  of  monogamy  has  served  its  purpose. 
It  has  made  Europe.  Now  new  forces  are  at  work.  A  very 
few  years  ago  divorce  was  impossible;  now  it  is  common. 
But  divorce  is  only  a  pis  aller,  I  will  readily  admit.  Neither 
do  I  advocate  the  Asiatic  system,  since  it  is  clumsy  and 
belongs  primarily  to  people  whose  peace  of  mind  has  not  been 
disturbed  by  such  things  as  modern  inventions.  But  some  day 
we  will  have  the  limited  marriage  contract — the  contract  ex- 
piring after  due  date.  That  is  what  we  are  fast  coming  to, 
and  that  is  the  proper  solution.  In  the  twenty-first  or  twenty- 
second  century,  five-  or  ten-year  marriages  will  certainly  be 
the  vogue,  I  believe.  Once  you  have  legalized  the  fashion 
they  will  be  looked  upon  as  no  more  strange  than  the  pres- 
ent lifelong  marriage.  You  may  say  it  is  not  polygamy,  yet 
it  is  practically  what  the  Chinese  do  to-day.  A  rich  China- 
man first  marries  only  one  wife  and  after  some  years — gen- 
erally ten  or  fifteen  years — begins  taking  secondary  wives. 
But  his  method  is  certainly  inconvenient.  The  first  wives 
become  a  nuisance — they  are  in  the  way.  The  Chinese 
method  is  unscientific;  we  would  have  to  improve  on  it." 

He  laughed  and  turned  to  look  at  his  companion.    He  was 


THE   HUMAN    COBWEB  265 

enjoying  himself  a  good  deal;  he  felt  rather  than  saw  that 
she  was  angry  with  him. 

"Wait  one  minute,"  said  she,  "and  finish.  Your  grand 
argument  is  that  man  and  woman  are  both  inconstant,  and 
that,  like  all  the  rest  of  the  animal  world,  a  change  of 
mates  from  time  to  time  would  not  only  be  desirable  but 
be  a  real  blessing." 

"Certainly." 

"Who  would  decide  when  the  change  should  be  made?" 

"The  legal  document — the  marriage  contract,  of  course." 

"But  then,  supposing  one  wished  to  renew  and  the  other 
didn't — what  would  happen?" 

"It  would  not  be  renewed." 

"And  you  think  that  would  work?" 

"Of  course ;  people  would  become  accustomed  to  it." 

"Well,"  said  Madame  Boisragon  slowly,  and  with  extraor- 
dinary earnestness,  "I  disagree  with  you  utterly." 

Peter  Kerr  laughed  once  more,  and  with  that  he  recovered 
his  levity  entirely. 

"Do  you  know  anything  about  Thibet?"  he  inquired  sud- 
denly. Madame  Boisragon  shook  her  head,  so  he  went  on: 

"Thibet  is  the  only  country  in  the  world  where  there  is  no 
recorded  friction  in  family  life.  There  every  woman  has  two 
husbands  or  more.  All  accounts  I  have  read  agree  in  saying 
that  polyandry  makes  woman  so  happy  that  there  actually  is 
complete  domestic  peace.  Her  husbands  obey  her  implicitly 
and  work  hard.  It  may  not  be  a  bit  true,  but  it  sounds 
pleasant — for  the  women." 

Madame  Boisragon  turned  and  looked  at  him  steadily. 

"You  are  talking  stupidly,  I  believe  on  purpose,"  she  said. 

"Stupidly?"  he  repeated  in  apparent  surprise.  "Well,  I  am 
sorry,  I  will  stop.  Perhaps  it  has  sounded  stupid.  Yet  I 
should  have  liked  to  tell  you  my  system  for  dealing  with  the 
discarded  husbands  and  wives.  It  is  at  least  highly  original." 

He  got  up  and  walked  to  where  the  small  boy  was  standing, 
feeling  that  once  more  she  had  held  him  off  at  arm's  length. 


266  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

The  naked  little  waif  was  now  looking  intently  skywards, 
and  as  Kerr  approached  him  he  uttered  some  unintelligible 
words  and  pointed  upwards  with  his  grimy  fingers.  The 
brilliant  sunlight  had  been  suddenly  blotted  out,  and  now 
across  the  skies  ominous  black  clouds  quickly  advanced.  It 
became  so  still  that  the  alarmed  twittering  of  the  birds  in  the 
trees  sounded  unusually  clear ;  whilst  the  dreamy  choruses  of 
the  grasshoppers  and  the  cicadas,  which  had  imparted  such  an 
air  of  pleasant  rural  peace,  soon  magically  ceased.  From 
the  clouds  a  cold,  disturbing  blast  of  air  was  blown  down,  and 
no  sooner  had  she  felt  this  than,  as  if  an  icy  hand  had  touched 
her,  Madame  Boisragon  started  up  with  a  little  cry  of  alarm. 
She  gazed  apprehensively  at  the  skies. 

"What  is  it?"  asked  Kerr,  retracing  his  steps. 

"A  thunder-storm  is  coming,"  she  exclaimed  in  great  agi- 
tation. "I  simply  hate  thunder  and  lightning.  You  do 
not  know  what  it  means  to  me.  They  say  the  storms  here 
are  very  bad.  What  shall  we  do  out  here  in  the  open  ?" 

She  began  wringing  her  hands.  Then,  without  waiting  for 
a  reply,  she  started  a  little  wildly  down  the  avenue  in  search 
of  the  ponies.  Kerr  gazed  after  her  with  wondering  eyes. 
A  storm  was  only  a  storm.  Why  was  she  so  alarmed  ? 

But  the  mafus,  already  apprised  of  what  was  coming,  were 
themselves  running  forward  tugging  the  ponies  after  them, 
and  Kerr  began  to  understand  that  they  were  in  for  some- 
thing bad.  The  prospect  of  the  whole  countryside  being  con- 
verted into  an  immense  shower-bath  was  certainly  not 
alluring. 

"Large  rain,  large  rain,"  called  the  mafus  warningly  to  him 
in  their  mangled  English,  as  a  few  heavy  drops  struck  down 
on  the  ground  with  great  force  and  the  tree-tops  were  bent 
by  a  sudden  blast  of  wind.  The  men  ran  the  ponies  along  at 
a  reckless  pace  and  brought  them  to  a  standstill  under  a  half- 
ruined  pavilion.  Then  they  set  to  work  to  make  themselves 
as  water-tight  as  possible.  This  consisted  mainly  in  tying 
cloths  around  their  heads  and  necks  so  that  their  precious 
hair  should  not  be  soaked ;  but  also,  with  an  eye  to  economy, 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  267 

they  took  off  their  boots  and  socks  and  rolled  their  trousers 
high  up.  Like  that  they  esteemed  themselves  fairly  safe. 

"We  have  apparently  really  got  to  see  a  big  storm  through," 
said  Peter  Kerr  at  length,  not  appreciating  these  prepara- 
tions very  much.  It  was  going  to  spoil  the  afternoon.  "We 
had  better  go  and  see  if  we  can  find  better  shelter  near  the 
tomb.  The  ponies  are  all  right  where  they  are.  Come  on." 

Madame  Boisragon  hurried  along  after  him  as  he  made  his 
way  through  a  small  gateway  into  an  inner  courtyard.  The 
rank  undergrowth  here  invaded  the  very  stone  pathways, 
making  it  necessary  for  him  to  kick  his  way  ungracefully 
forward.  The  century-old  trees,  standing  thickly  together, 
would  have  made  the  brightest  day  seem  dim:  now,  with 
the  great  black  clouds  piling  ever  more  thickly  on  top  of 
one  another  in  the  skies,  it  was  as  if  an  ugly  night  were  fast 
falling.  The  change  seemed  almost  miraculous. 

For  a  second  or  two  the  cold  wind  blew  as  at  the  beginning 
of  a  howling  gale ;  then  it  ceased,  and  suddenly  great  streaks 
of  blue-white  light  flashed  dazzlingly  above.  Crack,  crack, 
crack — a  series  of  tremendous  peals  of  thunder  rang  out,  as 
if  all  the  artillery  in  the  world  had  been  fired  off  at  once 
from  the  mountains  to  the  northwest.  It  was  stunning. 

Peter  Kerr  stopped  and  turned  hurriedly.  He  himself 
was  beginning  to  be  alarmed.  A  stream  of  cries  caught  his 
ears  as  the  mafus  shouted  at  and  chided  the  terrified  ponies 
in  excited  Chinese  shrieks.  It  reminded  him  of  a  scene  he  had 
read  of  in  some  boy's  book  of  adventure,  when  a  couple  of 
men,  pursued  into  a  great  cave  by  a  band  of  savage  South 
American  Indians,  had  as  a  last  resource  fired  off  barrel 
after  barrel  of  their  guns,  raising  such  a  thunder  of  sound 
that  blind  terror  had  promptly  ensued.  But  where  was 
Madame  Boisragon? 

"Where  are  you?"  he  called  loudly  in  alarm.  Where  had 
she  disappeared  to?  He  ran  back,  looking  everywhere. 

"Here,  here,"  answered  her  voice  piteously  at  last,  as  the 
last  peals  of  thunder  died  away,  and  the  rain  began  coming 
down  in  earnest.  He  found  her  crouching  down  so  low 


268  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

under  a  tree  as  to  be  completely  hidden.  He  made  a  dive 
and  pulled  her  hastily  out. 

"It's  all  right  now,"  he  protested,  fearing  nevertheless  that 
the  next  flashes  would  discredit  him  before  he  had  finished 
speaking.  "What  we  have  to  look  out  for  now  is  the  rain. 
It  is  going  to  rain  like  the  Deluge — quick!" 

Even  as  he  spoke  the  rain  seemed  to  thicken  until  it  formed 
ropes  of  water.  With  a  jerk  he  swung  his  companion  into 
his  arms  and  rushed  down  the  pathway  to  the  rear  of  the 
tomb.  The  rain,  driven  forcibly  along  by  the  mountain 
winds,  struck  through  his  clothing  as  if  it  had  been  mere 
paper.  Drenched  through  and  through  during  his  short 
run,  he  had  yet  the  satisfaction  of  knowing  that  his  burden 
was  half  sheltered;  and  gaining  the  lea  of  the  tomb,  he  set 
her  down  with  relief. 

Fortune  was  with  them.  A  great  hole  had  been  made  in 
the  massive  walls  of  the  tomb  by  the  gradual  falling  away 
of  the  brickwork,  and  it  only  needed  a  few  kicks  and  pulls 
to  dislodge  a  further  mass  of  crumbled  mortar  and  earth. 
Then  by  crouching  down  and  pressing  very  close  together  it 
was  possible  for  them  both  to  defy  the  elements  in  compara- 
tive safety. 

"Do  not  be  frightened,"  he  said  to  her,  wiping  the  trickles 
of  water  from  her  pale  face  with  his  soddened  handkerchief. 
"We  are  at  least  safe  here — quite  safe." 

This  was  a  curious  end  to  their  discussion,  he  thought,  as 
he  watched  the  rain. 


CHAPTER  XVIII 

"II  est  bien  difficile  de  garder  un  tresor  dont 
tous  les  hommes  ont  la  clef." — Tresor  du  monde, 
Book  II. 

THE  storm  passed  as  it  had  come — in  a  flash.  For  a  quarter 
of  an  hour,  perhaps,  the  lightning  had  dazzled  and  the 
thunder  had  rumbled  unceasingly,  but  it  was  never  as  bad 
as  the  opening  had  been.  The  battle  in  the  air  was  moving 
far  away  to  the  southeast,  at  the  rate  of  thirty  or  forty 
miles  an  hour,  the  atmosphere  being  attacked  and  cleansed 
in  Titanic  haste,  and  the  rain,  pouring  down  in  one  con- 
tinuous sheet,  soon  muffled  the  more  menacing  music  of  the 
heavens. 

Then,  just  as  the  lightning  and  thunder  had  somehow  dis- 
appeared, so  had  the  rain,  in  spite  of  the  most  frantic 
efforts,  become  discouraged.  From  being  a  veritable  deluge 
it  became  only  heavy  rain;  then  just  plain  rain;  and  at  last, 
with  a  final  spurt  of  discontent,  as  if  the  last  remains  of  a 
Gargantuan  watering-can  were  being  emptied  on  the  luck- 
less country,  it  suddenly  ceased.  The  sun  peeped  out  low 
down  on  the  western  horizon,  infinitely  pale  at  first,  as  if 
it  too  had  been  water-washed.  Yet,  as  the  last  beaten 
clouds  chased  away  to  the  south  and  the  rain-mists  faded 
into  thin  air,  it  deepened  quickly  to  a  ruddier  hue,  and  a 
great  rainbow  stretched  its  glorious  arc  sheer  across  the 
skies,  in  token,  as  the  babies  say,  that  never  again  shall 
there  be  a  Flood.  And  in  this  wise,  once  again  did  it 
become  a  beautiful  afternoon. 

It  was  different,  however,  from  what  it  had  been  before. 
Now,  though  the  insects  began  their  chirpings  anew,  and 
the  birds  twittered  ever-growing  choruses  of  relief,  all  was 
in  a  minor  key,  subdued  as  if  to  accord  with  the  newly- 


270  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

born  afternoon.  It  was  much  cooler;  it  was  much  fresher; 
there  was  not  a  particle  of  dust  in  the  air;  but  most  of  all, 
tingling  the  nostrils  and  dominating  everything  else,  was  the 
wholesome,  unaccustomed  smell  of  good  red  earth.  Nature, 
refreshed  and  rejoicing,  was  no  longer  in  a  languorous 
mood.  She  had  finished  with  that  for  to-day.  It  was  as  if 
she  were  reclining  after  great  athletics  which  had  been  fol- 
lowed by  copious  ablutions.  The  beasts  felt  it,  the  birds 
felt  it,  the  very  insects  felt  it.  No  wonder  that  even  unsen- 
sitive  man  should  understand  the  great  change  which  had 
come. 

Madame  Boisragon  and  Peter  Kerr,  forsaking  their  shelter, 
mounted  their  ponies  a  little  silently  and  rode  off  quickly. 
The  water-logged  country  opened  out  before  them  in  a 
vista  of  glistening  green  full  of  irregular  lakelets.  Men, 
with  their  trousers  tightly  rolled  up  to  their  thighs  and 
cloths  round  their  heads,  were  wading  here  and  there  slowly 
and  disconsolately,  engaged  in  fishing  things  out  of  the  flood. 
The  little  naked  brown  children  had  all  disappeared,  and 
only  now  and  again  could  a  wistful  little  face  or  two  be 
seen  peeping  out  of  broken  paper  windows,  or  from  a  half- 
closed  door.  Oh,  why  had  the  cruel  heavens  spoilt  the 
great  playground?  the  little  faces  seemed  to  say. 

A  faint  flush  came  to  Madame  Boisragon's  face  as  her 
pony  splashed  and  floundered  with  leaps  and  bounds  through 
the  great  pools  of  water  left  on  the  sunken  roads ;  and  once 
or  twice  she  shot  a  rapid  glance  at  her  escort  as  if  to  divine 
his  thoughts.  But  Kerr,  steaming  in  his  wet  clothes  as  he 
warmed  up  from  the  exercise  exactly  as  his  soddened  pony 
was  doing,  said  nothing  at  all.  He  seemed  to  be  entirely 
occupied  with  picking  his  way — almost  to  have  forgotten 
her  existence. 

She  would  have  liked  him  to  be  as  talkative  as  he  usually 
was ;  with  the  storm  over  and  done  with,  she  felt  immensely 
relieved  and  wished  to  show  it.  They  had  sat  for  nearly 
one  whole  hour  in  the  sheltering  hole  so  close  together  that 
the  warmth  of  their  bodies  had  intermingled  and  made  them 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  271 

almost  as  one.  The  immediate  effect  on  her  had  been  to 
abate  her  fear,  to  make  her  almost  indifferent  to  the  storm; 
the  effect  on  him  had  been  to  make  him  strangely  silent. 
He  had  not  even  tried  to  make  love  to  her  under  the  guise 
of  comforting  her,  as  he  might  easily  have  done  and  as  she 
had  half  expected  he  would  do,  from  what  she  knew  of  him. 
He  had  only  become  strangely  and  unaccountably  silent — 
as  if  he  had  said  all  he  had  to  say.  And  then,  before  the 
rain  had  entirely  stopped,  she  remembered  that  it  was  he 
who  had  first  got  up  and  suggested  that  it  was  worth  while 
trying  to  return  home. 

Why  had  he  done  it  ?  She  puzzled  her  brain  trying  to  solve 
the  problem,  and  as  she  could  find  no  solution,  a  curious 
irritation  grew  up  within  her.  Why  had  he  drawn  back — 
why  had  he  feigned  indifference — why  did  he  not  say  a 
word  now?  And  so,  thinking  in  this  way,  by  the  time  they 
had  reached  the  first  flanking  gate  of  the  city,  always  riding 
in  the  same  silence,  Madame  Boisragon  was  so  sure  that 
she  was  really  put  out  that  she  had  no  trouble  in  showing  it. 

"Thank  you,"  she  called  sarcastically  after  Peter  Kerr, 
who,  in  order  to  clear  the  way  for  her,  had  pressed  rapidly 
ahead,  and  had  inevitably  sent  back  great  splashes  of  black 
mud  from  his  pony's  hoofs.  A  little  had  even  hit  on  her 
cheeks,  and  as  she  reined  in  and  rubbed  it  off  with  her 
handkerchief  she  seemed  pinker  than  her  wont. 

"I  am  awfully  sorry,"  Kerr  apologized  somewhat  lamely, 
after  they  had  safely  negotiated  this  city  gate  and  the 
broken  bit  of  stoneway  beyond.  But  already  they  were  can- 
tering quickly  on  the  soddened  sand  stretches  under  the 
Tartar  Wall,  with  the  ponies  tugging  hard  at  their  bits  as 
their  instinct  told  them  they  were  racing  home.  Yet  she, 
on  her  part,  did  not  wish  to  get  home  so  quickly. 

"Oh,  don't  apologize,  pray,"  she  cried  ironically  in  return 
when  she  was  able.  "A  little  more  mud  can  make  no  dif- 
ference now."  And  with  that  she  resolutely  paid  him  no 
further  attention. 

Droves  of   shaggy  ponies  were   here   being   driven   along 


272  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

towards  the  main  city  entrances  by  wild-looking  mounted 
men,  armed  with  pointless  wooden  lances;  and  these  ponies 
showed  such  a  desire  to  stampede  after  them  that  there  was 
really  scant  excuse  to  talk.  And  then  there  was  another 
gateway  to  battle  with;  for  a  fierce  traffic,  long  held  in 
suspense  by  the  storm,  was  now  unloosening  itself  in  a 
savage  hurry,  and  close  attention  to  possible  dangers  was 
necessary.  And  so  it  came  to  pass  that  the  hotel  was 
reached  without  further  words  being  spoken. 

They  rode  their  sweating  ponies  into  the  courtyard  to  find 
that  another  home-coming  had  just  taken  place.  Tall,  thin, 
polite  Mr.  Smith,  with  his  hat  off  and  the  perspiration 
beading  his  forehead,  was  stroking  down  a  weather-worn 
pony,  as  if  in  sympathy  for  the  sad  state  to  which  the  weather 
had  reduced  them  both;  and  seated  on  the  wet  stone  steps, 
looking  more  fantastic  than  ever,  was  the  strange  little 
Mrs.  Hopeful,  calmly  engaged  in  pulling  up  a  pair  of 
mud-spattered  stockings.  The  ring  of  hoofs  made  the 
two  look  up,  and  instantly  the  little  woman  dropped  her 
stockings  and  burst  out  laughing. 

"What,  you  too?"  she  called  to  them  without  getting  up, 
laughing  more  and  more.  "I  thought  we  were  bad  enough, 
but  you Oh,  dear!" 

She  went  off  into  fresh  fits  as  their  plight  was  made  increas- 
ingly manifest  to  her.  Then  with  an  effort  she  recovered 
herself. 

"Poor  Madame  Boisragon,"  she  said,  going  up  to  her  as 
Kerr  helped  her  off  her  pony.  "I  am  really  awfully  sorry 
that  you  got  such  a  ducking.  You  don't  mind  my  laughing, 
do  you?  Jack  and  I  have  been  wading  through  mud  and 
water.  I  am  wet  up  to  here,"  pointing  to  her  waist.  "But 
you  two — you  must  have  swum!" 

Madame  Boisragon  laughed  back.  She  was  quite  happy, 
since  she  was  only  out  of  humour  with  one  particular  man. 
She  even  stretched  out  an  arm  to  show  Mrs.  Hopeful  how 
soddened  she  really  was.  The  tall,  thin  man,  immensely 
embarrassed  because  of  his  own  condition,  was  trying  to 


THE   HUMAN    COBWEB  273 

show  a  polite  yet  distant  interest  in  things,  and  now  offered 
Kerr  a  cigarette.  Kerr,  however,  did  not  make  any  attempt 
to  make  himself  agreeable;  he  smoked  his  cigarette  calmly 
and  waited  for  the  two  women  to  finish  their  gossiping. 

"We  shall  all  catch  our  deaths  of  colds,  Mrs.  Hopeful," 
said  Madame  Boisragon  at  length,  as  she  gave  her  pony  a 
farewell  carrot  and  came  up  the  steps. 

"Never,"  cried  the  little  woman;  "we  must  all  have 
brandy,  and  then  it  will  be  all  right.  Come  on,  everybody." 

She  led  the  way  unconcernedly  indoors,  rushing  into  the 
hall  like  a  whirlwind. 

"Carnot,"  she  called,  "Carnot!  Where  is  the  omnipotent, 
omnipresent  Carnot?" 

Several  boys  dawdling  on  benches  started  towards  her;  she 
waved  them  peremptorily  away. 

"I  don't  want  you,"  she  expostulated,  stamping  her  foot. 
"I  want  Carnot.  Where  is  Carnot — where  is  your  master?" 

Whilst  they  were  trying  to  explain  that  he  was  out  of  the 
hotel,  Lorenzo  appeared  and  politely  saluted  her  in  his 
elaborate  way. 

"Oh,"  she  cried,  "how  fortunate — how  very  fortunate — 
the  very  man!  I  want  you  so  badly,  Mr.  Lorenzo." 

The  Italian,  immaculately  clad  in  a  dark  blue  suit,  and 
looking  cool  and  clean,  assured  her  that  he  had  expressly 
come  downstairs  to  be  of  service  to  her.  As  he  spoke  he 
studied  with  amused  eyes  the  soddened  little  crowd.  It 
pleased  him  to  see  that  Kerr  looked  embarrassed. 

"After  saying  that,  though  it  isn't  a  bit  true,  you  can't 
be  angry,  Mr.  Lorenzo,"  continued  the  little  woman,  look- 
ing at  him  appealingly  and  shivering  her  skirts.  "We  want 
some  of  that  beautiful  cognac  of  yours  in  little  glasses,  to 
save  us  from  dying  of  colds.  Will  you  save  us?" 

"Why,  most  certainly,"  Lorenzo  replied,  for  though  his 
cognac  was  precious,  he  liked  to  appear  generous. 

Gallantly  enough  he  led  the  way  into  the  dining-room  and 
sent  his  servant  for  a  bottle  of  the  precious  brandy.  Then, 
filling  their  glassest  he  toasted  the  occasion;  and  taking 


274  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

no  denial,  he  insisted  on  filling  them  once  more.  It  was  a 
great  sacrifice,  but  noblesse  oblige! 

The  little  Englishwoman  drank  her  share  down  like  a  man. 

"It  always  goes  to  my  head  and  makes  me  dreadfully 
hilarious,"  she  whispered  to  Madame  Boisragon,  catching 
her  affectionately  by  the  hand.  "But  you  won't  be  shocked, 
will  you?  It  is  so  nice  having  you  here,"  she  continued. 
"I  never,  never  see  you,  you  know — excepting  just  by  chance 
like  this.  It  is  cruel !  Won't  you  join  us  to-night  in  a  little 
dinner-party?" 

Madame  Boisragon's  eyes  were  now  sparkling  from  the 
effect  of  the  exercise  followed  by  the  brandy.  Mrs.  Hope- 
ful looked  at  her  so  appealingly  that  she  did  not  know  what 
to  say. 

"I  would  really  like  to,"  she  answered,  "but  you 
know "  She  hesitated. 

"There  can  be  no  but,"  cried  the  little  Englishwoman 
vehemently.  "I  say  it  must  be:  I  have  decided  it.  Listen." 

She  addressed  all  of  them  generally,  thumping  on  the  table. 

"It  has  been  decided  that  we  all  dine  together  to-night  at 
eight  o'clock  more  or  less,  so  as  to  end  this  stormy  day 
properly.  I  will  tell  Carnot  to  let  us  have  his  little  dining- 
room.  Mr.  Lorenzo,  are  you  agreeable?" 

"Madame,  can  you  ask?"  answered  the  Italian.  "I  shall 
be  of  course  very  much  honoured."  He  inclined  his  head  in 
his  formal  way. 

"Splendid!  I  have  committed  Madame  Boisragon;  Jack 
never  counts:  there  only  remains  Mr.  Kerr.  Of  course  he 
will  come.  It  is  arranged!" 

Without  waiting  for  anything  else,  she  gave  orders  that 
Carnot  must  have  the  little  room  prepared  for  five  people 
by  eight  o'clock,  and  that  the  cook  should  exert  himself. 
Then  she  nodded  a  farewell  and  rushed  away  to  change. 

It  was  after  eight  o'clock  before  they  had  all  assembled 
again.  Lorenzo  had  had  to  go  out;  both  the  other  men 
had  had  letters  claiming  their  attention ;  and  the  two  ladies 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  275 

had  doubtless  employed  the  time  in  resting.  Carnot,  with 
his  usual  energy,  had  converted  the  dingy  little  room  he 
called  the  private  dining-room  into  a  more  inviting  place. 
With  the  aid  of  flowers  and  a  blackwood  screen  it  had 
assumed  such  a  changed  look  that  little  Mrs.  Hopeful  clapped 
her  hands  with  delight  when  she  saw  it. 

"Carnot,"  she  exclaimed  impulsively  as  he  stood  smiling 
in  front  of  her,  "you  actually  have  ideas,  and  in  spite  of 
your  sins,  some  day  should  make  your  fortune.  Now  help 
a  little  more.  Here  is  my  contribution  to  the  evening's 
festivities." 

She  dropped  an  armful  of  Chinese  embroideries  on  to  a 
chair  and  began  deftly  arranging  them  round  the  room. 
Chinese  mandarin  robes  of  gorgeous  colouring  and  pleated 
women's  skirts — articles  which  in  those  days  of  a  decade  ago 
were  sometimes  of  wonderful  embroidery — shared  the  dis- 
tinction of  being  suspended  at  different  angles  and  from  dif- 
ferent objects.  The  little  woman's  bizarre  taste  soon  con- 
verted the  room  into  a  veritable  curio-shop.  It  was  really 
pretty. 

"Now  we  are  ready,"  she  called,  going  to  the  door.  "Come, 
Madame  Boisragon — come  quickly,  le  diner  de  la  table 
d'hote  est  servi!" 

Madame  Boisragon,  who  had  been  occupying  herself  turn- 
ing over  the  leaves  of  an  ancient  illustrated  paper,  came 
in  quickly,  and  taking  hold  of  the  Englishwoman  by  the 
hand,  smilingly  whispered  something  into  her  ear. 

"How  absurd!"  protested  Mrs.  Hopeful,  throwing  back 
her  head  and  laughing.  "What  does  it  matter?  I  don't 
know  him  from  Adam  either.  Yet  he  can  be  amusing,  and 
that  is  the  principal  thing.  However,  to  oblige  you " 

She  went  to  the  door  and  met  the  three  men,  who  were 
coming  in  together. 

"Jack,  don't  laugh,"  she  exclaimed  impulsively.  "I  have 
just  realized  that  perhaps  some  of  us  don't  really  know  one 
another.  It  is  awfully  silly,  you  know,  but  to  save  trouble 
I  am  going  to  pretend  to  introduce  you  all." 


276  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

Half  laughing  and  half  serious,  first  she  seized  Lorenzo, 
and  twisting  him  around,  announced  his  name.  Then  she 
began  doing  the  same  to  the  other  two,  stopping  before 
she  had  properly  finished  and  rushing  to  the  table.  They 
did  not  know  exactly  how  to  take  it :  men  are  often  so  much 
more  stupid  than  women. 

"Now  that  we  know  one  another  more  or  less,"  she  cried, 
"I  am  going  to  arrange  the  table.  It's  like  a  Chinese  puzzle 
— you  will  observe  there  are  three  men  and  two  women. 
However,  I  have  the  solution." 

She  twisted  them  here  and  there  until  she  finally  had 
everybody  to  her  satisfaction.  Kerr  found  himself  between 
her  and  Madame  Boisragon.  On  the  opposite  side  were 
Lorenzo  and  Mr.  Smith.  The  ends  of  the  table  had  been 
purposely  left  vacant. 

"You  see,"  she  explained,  whilst  everybody,  excepting  Kerr, 
protested  that  the  arrangement  was  bad,  "I  want  to  talk 
to  Mr.  Lorenzo  and  I  like  to  talk  to  my  vis-a-vis,  for  then 
I  can  lean  my  arms  on  the  table  and  be  generally  ill-man- 
nered. If  I  put  Jack  on  my  side,  he  would  either  have  to 
be  next  to  me,  which  would  be  stupid,  or  be  in  the  corner 
where  I  couldn't  see  him.  And  following  that,  either  Mr. 
Kerr  or  Madame  Boisragon  would  have  to  cross  over.  Mr. 
Lorenzo  would  then  probably  not  talk  to  me.  If,  on  the 
other  hand,  I  put  Mr.  Kerr  across  the  table,  Jack  would 
be  absorbed  in  somebody  else,  which  I  couldn't  possibly  per- 
mit! Now  do  you  see  what  a  genius  I  have  shown?  You 
will  soon  be  happy." 

Her  voluble  and  intricate  explanations  having  reduced 
every  one  to  submission,  she  beckoned  to  her  own  servant 
and  whispered  something  into  his  ear.  Whilst  they  were 
still  talking  he  returned.  He  carried  on  a  tray  five  little 
glasses  all  ablaze. 

"My  own  special  brew,"  she  explained  with  sparkling  eyes. 
"You  absolutely  must,"  she  continued,  leaning  forward  and 
insisting  that  Madame  Boisragon  take  the  glass  which  Kerr 


THE   HUMAN    COBWEB  277 

was  offering  to  her.  "I  call  it  the  devil's  brew:  after  you 
have  drunk  it  anything  in  the  world  becomes  possible.  It  is 
the  ideal  drink  for  Peking  when  things  are  dull." 

Lorenzo,  who  was  interested  in  finding  out  the  secret  of 
this  new  invention,  began  plying  her  with  questions,  and 
turned  to  Mr.  Smith  for  help  when  Mrs.  Hopeful  refused 
to  divulge  her  recipe.  He  found  the  contents  of  the  little 
glass  excellent,  he  said;  for,  like  most  Latins,  Lorenzo  did 
not  really  love  ice-cold  cocktails  as  an  appetite-giver,  and 
infinitely  preferred  something  fantastic. 

Peter  Kerr,  with  a  minute  to  himself,  turned  to  Madame 
Boisragon  and  murmured  something  to  her  as  he  raised  his 
glass.  She  was  dressed  in  a  black  gown  covered  with  soft 
white  lace  round  her  throat,  and  he  thought  she  had  never 
looked  better.  Once  again  the  thought  rose  to  his  mind 
that  there  was  something  in  the  way  she  sat  suggestive  of 
the  unapproachable  nun. 

"I  am  glad  you  have  found  your  tongue  again,"  she 
answered  impassively  after  a  pause,  as  she  sipped  her  little 
glass.  "I  wondered  what  was  the  matter  with  you.  The 
wet  oughtn't  to  make  you  glum.  In  England  doesn't  it 
always  rain?" 

"Perhaps  it  wasn't  the  wet,"  he  suggested,  trying  to  meet 
her  eyes. 

"Oh!"  she  answered,  breaking  her  bread,  and  carefully 
watching  the  men  on  the  opposite  side  as  she  spoke.  "Per- 
haps, then,  you  were  angry  with  me  for  behaving  so  stupidly 
at  the  beginning  of  the  storm." 

"No,  certainly  not." 

He  set  down  his  little  glass.  "Won't  you  guess  again?"  he 
continued. 

She  shook  her  head;  something  told  her  that  there  was 
danger  in  his  voice. 

"What  is  the  use  of  guessing?"  she  answered  with  studied 
indifference.  "You  will  invent  something.  You  are  always 
doing  that,  to  lead  me  on  to  catch  me.  It  is  simply  a  ruse  on 
your  part." 


278  THE   HUMAN  COBWEB 

Mrs.  Hopeful  had  finished  her  explanations  and  now  leaned 
forward. 

"Madame  Boisragon,"  she  said  warningly,  shaking  a  finger, 
"I  shall  change  Mr.  Kerr  promptly  if  you  monopolize  him. 
I  warn  you." 

Kerr  came  to  the  rescue. 

"Unless  you  amuse  us,  we  must  amuse  ourselves,"  he  pro- 
tested to  the  little  woman. 

"In  a  minute  I  will  amuse  you,  I  promise  you," 
she  cried.  "Yes,  stupid,  now  of  course,"  she  said  in 
an  aside  to  the  boy  who  was  claiming  her  attention.  The 
boy  turned  and  corks  popped  violently. 

"This  is  a  dinner  a  la  russe,"  she  explained,  "with  only 
one  wine.  You  must  empty  your  glasses  each  time  you  drink, 
and  of  course  in  the  end  you  will  have  to  become  drunk  like 
the  Russians." 

"Elsie!"  protested  the  tall,  thin  man,  whilst  the  others 
laughed. 

"How  absurd  you  are,  Jack!  Of  course  I  mean  those  who 
want  to  get  drunk  if  they  please.  Have  you  ever  been 
properly  drunk,  Mr.  Lorenzo?" 

She  laughed  uproariously  at  her  own  question,  and  the 
Italian  met  her  in  the  same  spirit.  He  declared  that 
getting  drunk  after  the  polished  manner  of  the  connoisseur 
was  one  of  his  most  cherished  pursuits.  The  conversation 
having  become  general,  the  dinner  quickly  progressed. 

"You  have  not  yet  carried  out  your  promise  and  really 
amused  us,  Mrs.  Hopeful,"  said  Kerr  later  on,  during  a 
pause.  "Now  that  you  have  put  us  all  in  the  humour, 
amuse  us  properly." 

Mrs.  Hopeful  thought  a  minute,  and  suddenly  laid  down 
her  knife  and  fork  and  pushed  her  plate  away. 

"I  have  the  very  thing,"  she  exclaimed.  "I  will  tell  you 
about  a  Chinese  theatre  Jack  and  I  went  to  a  few  days  ago. 
It  was  the  most  curious  thing  I  have  ever  seen.  It  consisted 
merely  of  what  may  be  called  the  primitive  love-scene.  It 


THE   HUMAN    COBWEB  279 

was  really  wonderful.  Jack,  do  you  remember?"  She 
looked  laughingly  across  the  table. 

The  tall,  thin  man  suddenly  coloured  to  the  roots  of  his 
hair.  He  fingered  his  tie;  he  pulled  at  his  cuffs;  he  was 
the  personification  of  embarrassment. 

"I  say,  Elsie,"  he  protested  nervously,  "there  is  a  limit,  you 
know.  You  couldn't  possibly  tell  that  story  here.  I  mean 
to  say "  He  stopped  and  looked  at  her  imploringly. 

Lorenzo  was  smiling  all  over.  He  always  delighted  to 
see  this  curious  pair  fence  with  each  other.  They  were 
quite  beyond  him.  He  had  even  made  a  mot  about  them 
which  was  quite  clever,  but  which  need  not  be  set  down  here. 

"Do  not  disappoint  us,  Mrs.  Hopeful,"  he  begged,  with  a 
curious  expression  coming  into  his  eyes.  "You  have  whetted 
our  appetites:  you  must  go  on.  Never  mind  Mr.  Smith." 

"I  cannot  listen  to  it,"  said  the  tall,  thin  man  with  sudden 
resolution.  "Elsie!" 

"Jack,"  interrupted  the  little  woman  with  a  violent  stamp 
of  her  foot,  as  if  it  irritated  her  to  be  argued  with  before 
others,  "Jack!" 

He  raised  his  eyes  to  hers  unwillingly,  as  if  he  had  divined 
what  was  coming. 

"Now,  Jack,  be  quiet — do  you  hear?" 

With  a  sudden  movement  her  whole  body  seemed  to  stiffen 
and  her  eyes  became  like  saucers.  She  fixed  and  held  them 
on  the  man  for  perhaps  three  seconds  and  no  more.  Then 
as  suddenly  she  relaxed  herself  and  dropped  her  hands  on  her 
lap.  The  tall,  thin  man,  like  a  rabbit  which  has  miracu- 
lously escaped  the  charming  of  some  snake,  sat  stupidly  silent. 
It  was  over  very  quickly. 

rf Madonna  Santa!"  murmured  the  Italian  to  himself  as  he 
understood  what  had  happened.  Kerr  gazed  blankly 
between  the  two  men  opposite  him  as  if  he  were  totally 
unaware  of  this  strange  display;  yet  he  liked  it  so  little 
that  he  sat  very  still  for  many  minutes  afterwards.  As 
ior  Madame  Boisragon,  for  some  reason  the  colour  rushed 


280  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

to  her  pale  face  and  her  eyes  became  brighter^  Alone  the 
servants,  with  Eastern  impassiveness,  preserved  their  unal- 
tered demeanour. 

"Bother!"  said  the  little  woman  finally,  passing  a  hand 
across  her  forehead  in  the  midst  of  the  sudden  silence  which 
had  come.  "That's  put  me  in  the  wrong  mood  for  story-tell- 
ing— oh  yes,  entirely  the  wrong  mood!  You  must  give  me 
a  few  seconds."  Her  eyes  wandered  vaguely  round  the 
room. 

Finally  she  drank  a  little  Pommery  and  took  up  her  knife 
and  fork  again.  Suddenly  she  laid  them  down. 

"I  have  it,"  she  said  in  a  far-away  voice,  as  if  she  were 
speaking  to  herself.  "I  shall  tell  it  differently,  that  is  all. 
I  love  to  tell  stories — or  to  write  them  in  little  verses  which 
have  no  conclusion.  There  will  be  more  foreground — much 
more  foreground — the  play  will  be  far  in  the  background, 
an  incident,  an  explanation.  Also  I  shall  end  abruptly  and 
you  will  have  to  guess  most  of  the  story.  And  yet  it  will 
show  what  I  wish  to  show." 

She  settled  herself  thoughtfully  and  then  began.  There 
was  a  curious  magnetism  about  her  which  radiated  from  her 
whole  personality  and  fixed  the  attention  of  the  entire  little 
party. 

"Have  you  ever  seen  a  Chinese  theatre?"  she  said  conver- 
sationally. "If  not,  let  me  introduce  you  properly,  for  you 
have  to  begin  at  the  beginning  really  to  understand. 

"The  theatre  never  finds  itself  in  too  distinguished  a 
neighbourhood.  It  is  generally  up  some  -noisome  lane  where 
the  plaster  is  falling  from  the  walls  and  where  there  are 
hideous  stains  everywhere ;  and  along  the  lane  you  will  see, 
what  you  rarely  see  in  China  at  night,  women  at  the  street- 
doors — women  with  bold,  defiant,  painted  faces.  As  they 
stand  there  they  will  sometimes  even  stretch  out  their  hands 
and  smirk  and  smile.  In  this  lane  there  will  also  probably 
be,  wedged  in  between  dead  walls  which  are  curiously  out  of 
place,  butchers'  and  bakers'  shops,  with  numbers  of  rough- 
looking  loutish  apprentices  wearing  soiled  blue  aprons  attend- 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  281 

ing  to  the  night  customs  and  making  an  uproarious  din. 
In  the  light  of  the  smoky  lamps  you  can  easily  see  that  it  is 
simply  Europe  of  the  age  of  Rabelais.  The  butcher-boys 
will  be  hacking  off  ribs  of  pork  with  square-looking  choppers, 
and  shouting  away  ugly-looking  dogs  which  creep  with 
infinite  cunning  between  their  very  legs;  or,  if  their  work 
is  finished,  they  will  stand  grouped  together  with  their 
greasy  arms  akimbo,  leering  at  the  women  and  exchanging 
jests.  The  baker-boys  will  be  busy  no  matter  what  the  hour 
may  be,  for  their  custom  never  ceases,  and  almost  all  night 
you  may  hear  the  smack  and  rattle  of  their  thin  rolling-pins 
as  they  handle  masses  of  rough-looking  dough  and  sing  the 
praises  of  their  cakes  to  the  crowds  that  pass  in  monotonous 
chants. 

"All  sorts  of  people  come  along  on  their  way  to  the 
theatre — rich  men  and  poor  men,  men  in  silk  and  satins,  and 
men  in  cotton  and  rags — all  sorts  and  conditions  of  men 
mixing  impartially  in  the  wonderful  democracy  of  the  East. 
For  if  the  play  is  not  a  historical  play,  it  will  be  merely  a 
series  of  presentations  of  vice  rewarded.  It  will  be  openly 
immoral — extraordinarily  gross.  I  call  it  vice  rewarded. 
The  men,  therefore,  go  to  whet  their  appetites,  and  nothing* 
else.  In  well-ordered  cities  these  plays  are  condemned  to 
mat-sheds  which  must  be  erected  outside  city  limits,  but  just 
now,  as  things  are  a  little  disordered  in  the  empire,  every- 
thing is  permitted. 

"Jack  and  I  strayed  into  this  particular  theatre  by  chance 
just  as  it  was  getting  dark,  and  we  left  after  one  piece, 
which  was  all  we  could  really  stand.  It  was  primitive 
Romeo  and  Juliet.  This  is  what  we  saw. 

"There  was  a  great  crowd  sitting  silently  on  rough  benches 
which  rose  tier  after  tier  until  a  sort  of  gallery  was  reached 
where  people  were  standing  or  walking  about.  The  air 
was  thick  with  the  smell  of  all  this  humanity — the  smell 
was  the  essential  atmosphere.  One  piece  had  just  been 
ended,  and  proceeding  from  somewhere  behind,  in  anticipa- 
tion of  the  raising  of  the  curtain,  was  a  noisy,  weird  music 


282  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

made  with  flutes  and  flageolets  and  brass  cymbals,  all  pitched 
very  high  and  making  the  oddest  intervals. 

"This  music  ended  abruptly  with  the  beating  of  a  muffled 
gong,  and  then  the  curtains  swung  off  the  stage  to  the  right 
and  left  and  disclosed  a  throng  of  brilliantly-dressed  people 
who  bowed  and  walked  to  and  fro  and  then  very  slowly 
melted  away.  This  was  a  sort  of  prologue,  I  suppose,  to 
illustrate  the  human  comedy ;  for  the  next  thing  we  realized 
was  that  a  small-footed  and  very  much  affected  young 
woman,  all  painted  and  powdered,  had  tottered  on  to  the 
stage  and  seated  herself  in  a  chair.  After  a  pause  she  took 
from  the  table  beside  her  a  little  looking-glass,  and  during 
a  few  seconds  gave  a  marvellous  sketch  of  female  vanity. 
She  was  in  love  with  her  own  beauty — that  was  quite  plain  ; 
she  thought  she  was  exquisite,  perfect — everything  that  could 
be  desired. 

"But  soon  she  sighed  and  showed  that  something  was 
lacking.  Then  she  picked  up  a  book,  only  to  throw  it  down 
with  eloquent  gestures  showing  that  she  could  not  read. 
A  door  opened,  and  an  old  woman,  an  amah,  appeared 
carrying  tea,  which  she  spread  before  her  mistress.  These 
two  talked  for  a  while — the  mistress  plainly  showing  her 
ennui,  the  old  servant  seeking  with  marvellous  touches  to 
put  her  into  a  better  humour.  You  must  remember  that  for 
us  it  was  pure  pantomime :  yet  I  do  not  think  that  we  really 
missed  a  word. 

"Presently  the  amah  retired,  and  then  returned  bearing  a 
little  pewter  jug  of  wine,  which  she  began  heating  over  a 
brazier.  Soon  she  poured  out  a  cup  for  her  mistress  and 
offered  it  to  her.  The  mistress  refused  petulantly;  was 
tempted  again;  relaxed  a  little;  and  finally  accepted  and 
gingerly  sipped  the  little  cup.  The  old  woman  cunningly 
filled  the  cup  immediately  it  was  empty  and  pressed  it  once 
more  on  her.  This  time  the  young  woman  needed  no  per- 
suasion; she  drank  it  down  quickly.  At  once  the  amah  cast 
a  cautious  look  round  her  and  began  artfully  whispering  into 
the  young  woman's  ear.  At  first  the  young  woman  almost 


THE  HUMAN   COBWEB  283 

jumped  up  in  her  righteous  indignation:  the  old  woman 
returned  to  the  pewter  jug  and  plied  her  with  wine  again. 
Gradually  the  young  woman  began  to  give  way;  her  head 
nodded  drowsily;  and  at  length  she  suffered  the  amah  to 
lead  her  off  to  the  back  of  the  stage,  where  she  disappeared 
behind  some  curtains. 

"The  lights  on  the  stage  had  suddenly  become  dimmed, 
and  like  a  shadow  the  old  amah  now  passed  across  to 
another  door.  A  few  seconds  elapsed  and  she  entered 
again — behind  her  coming  Romeo,  a  handsome  young  man, 
immaculately  dressed.  The  old  amah  made  a  few  gestures; 
the  young  man  poured  money  into  her  hand;  and  then 
stealthily  he  disappeared  where  his  lady  love  had 
gone.  .  .  ." 

Mrs.  Hopeful  stopped  suddenly  and  laughed  hysterically, 
as  if  she  were  infinitely  amused.  You  could  have  heard  a 
pin  fall  in  the  little  dining-room. 

"You  have  all  become  wonderfully  attentive,"  she  said, 
looking  round  the  table,  "but  I  am  afraid  I  simply  cannot 
conclude.  I  can  only  refer  you  to  a  certain  poem  of  our 
own  incomparable  Shakespeare.  The  final  departure  of 
the  young  man  was  a  wonderful  piece  of  acting.  But  there 
were  details  after  that  which  were  an  education  in  them- 
selves of  the  Oriental  mind. 

"Jack,"  she  said,  leaning  across  the  table,  "do  you  remem- 
ber that  last  little  touch  between  the  amah  and  the  mistress 
after  the  Fall?" 

The  tall,  thin  man  coloured  desperately  once  more. 

"Elsie,"  he  said  finally,  "how  can  you?" 

"How  can  I  what?"  she  replied  sharply.  "I  have  said 
nothing:  I  have  only  conjured  up  the  scene  for  you  once 
more.  Madame  Boisragon,"  she  continued,  turning  to  the 
Frenchwoman,  "I  ask  you  is  there  anything  in  what  I  have 
told  you  unfit  for  a  grown-up  responsible  person  to  hear?" 

Lorenzo  did  not  let  her  reply. 

"But,  Mrs.  Hopeful,  we  are  waiting  for  the  denouement," 
he  said  in  absolute  calmness;  "surely  you  will  not  con- 


284  THE  HUMAN  COBWEB 

elude  in  the  middle.  You  have  only  brought  us  up  to  where 
the  lovers  meet  in  the  retirement  of  the  enchanted  alcove.  It 
must  have  been  just  then  that  things  became  interesting." 

Mrs.  Hopeful  suddenly  collapsed  in  her  chair  and  went 
into  little  shrieks  of  laughter,  as  if  the  memory  of  what  had 
occurred  was  too  much  for  her. 

"Oh,  oh,  my  dear  Mr.  Lorenzo,"  she  finally  gasped,  "some 
day,  when  I  know  you  better,  I  may  whisper  you  everything 
down  to  the  very  last  details.  I  shall  make  a  Chinese 
theatre-goer  of  you  yet!" 

The  dinner  was  practically  concluded,  and  somehow  with 
the  end  of  Mrs.  Hopeful's  story  nobody  had  very  much  to 
say.  Mr.  Smith  looked  as  if  he  wanted  to  go. 

"Cannot  we  prolong  the  entertainment  a  little?"  said  Kerr 
mischievously  as  they  lighted  cigarettes.  "Mrs.  Hopeful, 
you  who  have  so  many  ideas,  suggest  something." 

She  blew  a  reflective  little  cloud  of  smoke  from  her  lips. 

"Do  you  believe  in  spirits?"  she  asked  abruptly. 

"Certainly — if  it  is  necessary." 

"And  you,  Mr.  Lorenzo?" 

The  Italian  smiled  and  made  a  curious  deprecative  gesture. 

"Credo  in  un  Dio  crudel  che  mha  creato"  he  quoted 
dramatically.  "After  that  nothing  is  impossible.  So  I  will 
believe  in  anything." 

"We  are  a  crowd  of  believers,  then,"  mused  Mrs.  Hopeful. 
"What  a  pity  we  are  only  five!  Seven  is  the  mystic  number; 
without  seven  nothing  is  any  use." 

She  looked  at  a  tiny  watch  on  her  bracelet. 

"It  is  a  nuisance  it  is  so  late,"  she  exclaimed,  "otherwise 
I  could  get  two  more  men — a  rather  mad  American  and  a 
superstitious  Spaniard.  They  would  do  admirably.  How- 
ever, I  shall  remember,  and  one  day  we  can  have  a  proper 
seance.  Let  me  tell  you  about  the  Spaniard." 

She  launched  out  into  an  entertaining  description  of  how 
he  had  arrived  from  gay  Madrid  to  find  everything  here 
terrible  to  his  artistic  soul.  The  place  was  a  nightmare,  he 
proclaimed — the  women  ice-cold,  the  men  brutes. 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  285 

Mrs.  Hopeful  was  still  describing  the  man  when  an  alter- 
cation at  the  door  stopped  her.  The  servants  were  trying 
to  prevent  some  one  from  coming  in,  and  they  were  not 
succeeding.  Lorenzo  turned  and  then  instantly  jumped  up. 
First  asking  permission,  he  motioned  to  the  servants  to 
stand  aside  and  let  the  intruder  in.  A  tall  Chinaman,  in 
high  riding-boots  and  official  clothes,  showing  that  he  had 
ridden  straight  from  his  masters  to  this  destination,  came 
quickly  in,  and  bending  a  knee  after  the  Manchu  fashion 
to  Lorenzo,  took  a  big  envelope  from  a  red  portfolio  and 
handed  it  over.  Then  with  a  bow  he  quickly  disappeared. 

"I  think  I  must  ask  you  to  excuse  me,"  said  the  Italian, 
not  seating  himself  again.  "You  see  my  business  calls  me, 
though  the  hour  is  late."  And  without  further  explanation 
he  left. 

"Jack,  I  think  we  must  go  too,"  said  the  little  woman,  rising 
a  few  minutes  later.  "Mr.  Kerr,  I  am  sure  you  will  see 
Madame  Boisragon  safely  upstairs." 

The  two  went  a  little  silently  up  to  their  rooms.  They 
had  nothing  much  to  say,  for  it  had  been  a  long  day  and 
perhaps  they  were  tired. 

"Good-night,"  said  Madame  Boisragon  when  she  reached 
her  door,  holding  out  her  hand. 

"Good-night,"  said  Kerr,  taking  it  and  not  releasing  it  at 
once.  She  had  already  opened  her  door ;  it  was  dark  within. 

"They  have  not  lighted  your  lamps,"  he  remarked,  after 
a  brief  pause,  searching  for  his  match-box  and  trying  to  talk 
calmly.  He  struck  a  match  and  went  in:  he  felt  rather 
than  saw  that  she  was  following.  Suddenly  he  dropped  the 
match  with  an  exclamation  as  it  burnt  him.  They  were  in 
the  dark  together  now.  Yielding  to  an  irresistible  impulse, 
he  turned  and  held  her  fast. 

"I  love  you,"  he  said,  breathing  quickly. 

"Oh  no!     Oh  no!"  she  protested,  trying  to  pull  away. 

His  answer  was  lost  as  he  went  to  heaven  against  her  lips. 


CHAPTER  XIX 

"II  y  a  mes  amis  qui  m'aiment,  raes  amis  qui  ne 
se  soucient  pas  du  tout  de  moi,  et  mes  amis  qui 
me  detestent." — CHAMFORT. 

MRS.  HOPEFUL  balanced  herself  on  the  points  of  her  toes 
and  pouted. 

"Don't  be  so  silly,  Jack,"  she  expostulated.  "What  has  to 
be  done  must  be  done,  especially  when  people  write  their 
Days  with  a  capital  D.  That  means  the  imperative.  It  is 
a  bore,  of  course,  but,  my  dear  Jack,  we  cannot  change 
the  world." 

Though  the  little  woman  pretended  to  laugh  as  she  con- 
cluded this  speech,  she  looked  at  the  man  with  anxious  eyes; 
for  was  she  not  purposely  avoiding  the  main  issue  and  hoping 
that  he  would  not  bring  it  up? 

Tall  Mr.  Smith,  unconvinced  and  somewhat  unhappy,  still 
stood  between  her  and  the  waiting  cart.  He  did  not  want 
her  to  go  a  bit.  If  she  went,  why  couldn't  he  go  too? 
It  was  a  stupid  world,  and  his  looks  showed  his  displeased 
appreciation  of  the  fact.  The  carter,  who  was  waiting  to 
drive  the  lady  to  her  destination,  regarded  the  two  as  they 
fenced  with  the  unmoving  phlegm  of  his  race.  He  was  in 
the  foreign  trade;  and  if  he  had  told  all  the  funny  things 
he  had  seen  since  the  day  he  had  begun  to  drive  these  strange 
outlanders,  his  countrymen  would  have  called  him  mad. 

"How  long  will  you  be,  Elsie?"  said  Mr.  Smith  finally,  as 
if  he  had  secretly  decided  to  capitulate  but  was  ashamed  to 
say  so  openly.  He  fingered  his  tie  and  his  thin  wisp  of  a 
moustache  alternately,  as  if  that  double  action  brought  him 
comfort.  Yet  hang  it — it  was  a  beastly  bore!  "How  long 
will  you  really  be?"  he  repeated. 

Mrs.  Hopeful,  confronted  with  a  pointed  question,  drew 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  287 

up  her  shoulders  sharply  and  held  them  thus,  at  the  same 
time  spreading  out  her  hands.  She  could  be  a  very  expressive 
little  person. 

"How  long?"  she  exclaimed.  "Dear  me,  don't  ask!  That 
depends  on  the  cats!  If  there  is  much  catting,  I  may  be 
rather  long.  Women  are  often  so  odious  to  one  another: 
and  you  see  I  may  have  to  scratch  back.  Otherwise  it  will 
be  over  with  refreshing  suddenness.  In  the  latter  case,  I 
shall  go  in,  drink  a  cup  of  tea,  and  then  fly  back.  Dear 
Jack — cousin  mine — go  for  a  walk,  and  shake  up  your  liver ! 
It  must  be  that  which  is  worrying  you.  I  shall  have  plenty 
to  tell  you  when  I  get  back,  I  warrant  you.  Think  how 
lucky  you  are  in  that  you  are  not  a  woman!" 

Tall,  thin  Mr.  Smith,  thus  variously  adjured,  finally 
resigned  himself  to  the  inevitable.  He  would  try  to  kill 
time  alone,  he  said  mournfully  with  the  air  of  a  martyr. 
Reluctantly  he  placed  himself  so  that  with  the  aid  of  the 
carter's  little  bench  Mrs.  Hopeful  could  now  vault  on  to  the 
blue  cushions  of  the  cart.  She  shot  a  last  glance  at  him,  to 
see  if  he  was  really  safe,  and  then,  with  the  lightness  of  a 
bird,  up  she  jumped.  The  old  carter  promptly  removed  the 
little  bench  and  gathered  up  his  hempen  reins.  There  had 
been  enough  of  this  trifling;  so  unceremoniously,  with  the 
expressive  tongue-clacking  and  sudden  ejaculations  of  his 
trade,  he  started  his  mule. 

"Au  revoir,  Jack,"  called  the  little  woman,  opening  her 
parasol  as  the  cart  jogged  forward.  She  balanced  herself 
to  the  rocking  of  the  cart  with  the  glee  of  a  girl.  "Jack" 
waved  his  hand  a  little  vaguely,  as  if  he  were  thinking  hard, 
and  then  turned  and  slowly  re-entered  the  hotel.  Mrs. 
Hopeful  smiled  to  herself.  She  had  won  her  battle  and 
would  pay  her  call  alone.  Men  are  so  stupid — sometimes. 

"Kuai-kuai-ti,  hurry  up,  old  man,"  she  urged  the  carter, 
looking  at  the  little  watch  on  her  bracelet.  The  old  carter, 
duly  apprised  that  his  fare  was  in  a  hurry,  allowed  his  harm- 
less whip  to  descend  on  the  mule's  tough  hide  in  frequent 
and  quite  ineffective  castigations.  The  old  mule  had  the 


288  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

pace  which  the  gods  had  given  her — why  hurry  or  worry? 
Mrs.  Hopeful,  with  her  legs  swinging  to  and  fro  as  she  sat 
on  the  shafts,  much  as  a  circus-rider  sits  her  steed  between 
the  intervals  of  hoop-jumping,  nodded  and  laughed  at  two 
or  three  acquaintances  she  passed  on  the  road.  She  had 
fallen  very  quickly  into  local  ways,  and  she  could  now  sit 
this  peculiar  conveyance  with  any  man.  In  any  case,  it  was 
only  a  step  to  her  destination.  No  sooner  had  she  passed 
in  through  the  big  Legation  Gates  than  she  jumped  from  her 
seat  with  the  agility  of  a  boy. 

"Now,  wait  here,  do  you  understand,  old  man?"  she  said 
with  a  vigorous  pantomime. 

The  old  carter  smiled  at  her  as  if  she  had  been  his  child, 
and  this  time  showed  that  he  understood  most  remarkably 
well  by  nonchalantly  producing  a  little  pipe  and  making  care- 
ful preparations  to  smoke. 

"Hao-la,  hao-la"  he  said  reassuringly.  He  had  done  this 
thing  a  thousand  times;  yet  every  time  he  drove  these 
foreigners  they  acted  like  this — as  if  he  would  fly  away! 

Mrs.  Hopeful  threw  a  last  glance  at  her  muslin  dress,  and 
wondered  whether  it  was  much  crumpled  behind.  Then, 
without  deciding  this  difficult  point,  she  closed  her  parasol 
with  a  snap. 

"Here  goes,"  she  said  to  herself,  with  a  deep  breath,  as  if 
she  were  about  to  take  a  cold  bath.  She  would  not  have 
dreamed  of  confessing  it,  but  she  was  in  her  heart  of  hearts 
a  lit/le  nervous.  This  diplomatic  world — stiff,  cold,  unsym- 
pathetic— was  her  bugbear. 

At  the  front  door  two  attentive  boys  tried  to  relieve  her 
of  her  parasol. 

"No,  stupids,"  she  caustically  remarked,  "that  goes  in  with 
me.  Which  door?" 

The  servants  threw  open  an  entrance:  Mrs.  Hopeful 
dived  through.  It  was  really  stupid  of  her  to  be  so 
nervous — but  the  idea  of  cats.  .  .  . 

A  murmur  of  voices  came  from  somewhere  in  the  middle 
distance.  The  murmur  died  down,  and  then  ceased  as  her 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  289 

footsteps  sounded  the  alarm.  Mrs.  Hopeful,  a  little  blinded 
by  the  fierce  glare  on  the  streets,  blinked  her  eyes  for  a 
moment  in  doubt. 

"We  are  out  here,"  called  a  voice,  and  Mrs.  Hopeful, 
hurrying  forward,  came  to  a  window  opening  on  to  a  cool 
verandah.  Though  it  was  so  early,  half-a-dozen  people  were 
already  out  there  having  tea.  Mrs.  Hopeful  sought  her 
hostess  and  shook  hands. 

"We  are  so  glad  it's  only  you,"  said  Baroness  Waffen, 
lazily  greeting  her.  "Monsieur  de  Boyar  was  just  beginning 
a  story  which  he  swears  he  will  tell  en  petite  comite.  In 
fact,  if  he  allows  you  to  listen  at  all,  you  may  count  yourself 
among  the  elect.  Sit  down,  my  dear,  and  be  prepared  to 
be  amused.  Do  you  know  the  others?" 

The  Baroness  Waflen  began  pouring  out  tea.  The  Bar- 
oness had  a  certain  cachet  of  her  own.  Once  she  had  had 
almost  permanently  attached  to  her  as  cavaliere  servante  a 
distinguished  K.C.B.  The  honourable  gentleman's  lettering 
was  translated  as  "Knight  Commander  of  the  Baroness," 
and  immoderate  laughter  was  his  lot,  for  he  had  passed  the 
age  for  such  attachments.  As  for  the  Baroness,  being  a 
woman,  she  drew  therefrom  a  certain  renown  which  made 
her  interesting  without  being  really  wicked.  She  was  withal 
a  singularly  agreeable  person,  and  Mrs.  Hopeful  liked  her 
exceedingly. 

"I  am  sure,"  said  Mrs.  Hopeful,  "that  if  Monsieur  de 
Boyar  tells  a  story,  I  shall  duly  scream  with  laughter." 

The  thin  Russian  secretary  who  was  to  amuse  them  made 
his  face  even  more  ratlike  than  usual  and  then  bowed  with 
mock  gravity.  He  was  a  perfect  raconteur,  and  he  knew  it. 
In  four  languages,  it  was  said,  he  could  tell  the  same  story 
equally  well — that  is,  equally  absurdly.  It  was  a  great 
gift,  such  as  Russians  often  have. 

"You  will  not  betray  me,"  he  first  begged  of  Mrs.  Hopeful, 
with  his  hands  folded  as  in  prayer. 

Mrs.  Hopeful  laughed  gaily.  Her  relief  was  great. 
Things  were  so  different  from  what  she  anticipated. 


290  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

"Proceed  in  peace,"  she  said,  fixing  on  him  her  great 
staring  eyes.  "I  am  above  suspicion,  I  assure  you." 

De  Boyar  crossed  his  spider-like  legs  and  cracked  the  joints 
of  his  hands.  In  spite  of  his  charming  manner,  he  had 
singularly  ugly  and  clawlike  hands,  which  for  some  reason 
he  persisted  in  bringing. into  prominence. 

"It  is  all  about  a  youthful  colleague  of  mine,"  he  began 
conversationally  in  his  purring  English,  "a  colleague  who 
is  now  in  Petersburg.  Nearly  all  of  you  know  Kornoff, 
since  he  was  here  up  to  three  months  ago,  so  I  will  not 
describe  him. 

"Kornoff  is  a  thorough  Russian — that  is,  he  is  very  casual, 
and  nothing  matters  to  him.  Kornoff 's  great  mot  is  that 
if  there  is  a  way  in  there  must  be  equally  well  a  way  out, 
which  is  rather  good  philosophy.  This  spring,  as  he  had  been 
playing  much  tennis  with  the  daughter  of  the  Belgian  com- 
mercial attache,  some  people,  of  course,  thought  that  it 
would  be  very  nice  if  he  married  her.  People  are  always  so 
kind." 

De  Boyar 's  ratlike  eyes  jumped  from  face  to  face,  and  at 
length  fixed  themselves  on  the  most  disapproving  countenance 
in  the  circle,  which  belonged  to  a  Mrs.  Jackson.  He  liked 
to  have  that  sort  of  inspiration,  he  said,  for  he  was  quite 
impervious  to  frowns  and  silent  condemnation.  So,  having 
found  what  he  sought,  he  now  went  on: 

"One  day  his  friend  little  Bolivar,  who  represents  Chili, 
went  round  to  see  him,  and  began  talking  to  him.  Bolivar 
never  has  anything  to  do. 

"  'She  is  a  nice  girl,  the  daughter  of  the  Belgian  commercial 
attache'  began  little  Bolivar. 

1  'Yes,'  agreed  our  young  ass  Kornoff,  who  was  half 
asleep  on  a  sofa.  'She  is  very  nice.' 

"  'Why  do  you  not  marry  her  ?'  suggested  the  Chilian. 

'  'Marry  her?'  echoed  Kornoff,  who  was  falling  asleep 
again;  'but  I  have  not  thought  of  it.' 

"  'I  will  arrange  it,'  cried  Bolivar,  jumping  to  his  feet. 

"  'Oh,  you  are  very  clever,'  replied  Kornoff  dreamily. 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  291 

**  'We  shall  see,'  argued  the  Chilian. 

"Kornoff  thought  nothing  more  about  the  matter  until  a 
few  days  later,  when  little  Bolivar  appeared  once  more.  He 
was  quite  excited. 

"  'I  have  great  news,'  he  cried ;    'try  and  guess/ 

"Kornoff  jumped  up. 

"  'Is  it  war  perhaps?'  he  asked  gravely. 

"The  Chilian  laughed  loudly. 

'  'War!'  he  exclaimed;  fquest-ce  que  vons  me  chantez-la? 
No,  it  is  far  better  than  that!  I  congratulate  you  with  all 
my  heart,  my  dear  fellow.' 

"He  came  forward  and  put  out  his  hand. 

"Kornoff  shook  hands  willingly  enough,  since  that  cost 
nothing,  and  then  inquired  whether  perhaps  he  had  been 
made  an  Ambassador  somewhere. 

"  'Ambassador!'  laughed  the  Chilian.  'No,  it  is  I  who  have 
been  the  ambassador!  Lucky  fellow,  you  are  accepted — 
you  are  accepted.' 

"Kornoff  began  to  get  alarmed. 

'  'What  do  you  mean  ?'  he  inquired  nervously. 

"  'That  you  are  duly  engaged — you  are  fiance — I  have 
arranged  everything.' 

'"To  whom?' 

'  'To  the  daughter  of  the  Belgian  commercial  attache  f  of 
course/  replied  the  Chilian,  a  little  irritably  now.  'She 
accepts  you,  my  dear  fellow,  she  accepts  you.  Will  you 
finally  understand?' 

"Kornoff,  when  he  finally  understood,  flew  into  a  towering 
rage.  Think  of  it,  he  was  fiance  malgre  lui!  The  Chilian 
protested  that  it  would  be  a  question  of  a  duel  if  he  went  back 
on  him;  and  so,  to  make  a  long  story  short,  as  he  did  not 
want  to  fight  a  duel  in  addition  to  being  engaged,  our  young 
Russian  friend  finally  gave  way,  put  on  his  frock  coat,  and 
paid  a  visit  of  ceremony  in  company  with  the  Chilian  charge. 
He  accepted  the  situation.  As  far  as  I  remember,  that  is  all 
there  is  of  act  one." 

De  Boyar  shot  a  glance  round  the  circle  and  gaily  pro- 


292  THE   HUMAN    COBWEB 

ceeded.  Mrs.  Jackson  was  looking  more  sour  than  ever. 
He  was  satisfied. 

"The  next  thing  that  happens  is  that  Kornoff  suddenly 
receives  a  telegram  from  his  old  mother  in  Russia,  saying 
that  she  is  very  sick.  He  obtains  leave  from  the  Minister 
to  return  home  at  once.  There  is  general  commiseration. 
Poor  fellow — just  engaged  and  yet  to  have  to  go  away! 
Quite  sad — is  it  not?  But  before  departing  he  decides  that 
he  must  give  a  dinner  to  his  bachelor  friends  to  celebrate 
the  end  of  his  salad  days.  That  idea  of  the  dinner  was 
rather  clever.  Everybody  who  heard  of  it  said,  'Kornoff, 
who  is  engaged  and  going  to  see  his  sick  mother,  is  giving 
a  dinner.'  Forty  of  us  went,  and  on  the  menus  what  do 
you  think  we  found?  In  honour  of  the  occasion  there  was 
printed  first  the  Russian  flag  on  one  side,  then  the  Chilian 
flag  on  the  other  side — to  represent  the  happy  mediation — 
and  in  the  middle  the  Chinese  flag!  Of  the  Belgian  flag — 
the  flag  of  the  betrothed — there  was  no  trace.  It  was  won- 
derful! 

"The  next  morning  at  daybreak  Kornoff  leaves  for  Russia. 
After  he  had  been  away  a  month  and  no  news  came,  his 
fiancee 's  family  began  to  get  anxious.  What  disaster  has 
happened  to  him?  Another  month  went  by.  There  being 
no  answers  to  letters,  they  begin  telegraphing.  Still  no 
answers.  They  consult  all  their  friends  in  search  of  com- 
fort. Finally  somebody  had  an  idea:  they  send  a  last  tele- 
gram with  the  answer  prepaid!  This  at  least  is  successful. 
Kornoff  replies  briefly  that  his  old  mother  still  being  very 
sick,  he  will  meet  his  fiancee  in  three  months'  time  in  Brus- 
sels. He  cannot  return  so  far  away  from  his  sick  mother." 

De  Boyar  stopped  for  a  moment  and  began  laughing  spas- 
modically. His  gravity  deserted  him  at  the  critical  moment. 
Everybody  was  convulsed.  His  absurd  way  of  talking  was 
inimitable. 

"But  let  me  tell  you  the  end,"  he  at  last  managed  to  gasp. 
"Kornoff  is  an  orphan  and  has  already  applied  for  transfer 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  293 

to  South  America!  We  have  just  heard  it  from  Petersburg. 
Is  it  not  killing?" 

Baroness  Waffen  was  the  first  to  recover  herself. 

"It  is  too  cruel,"  she  said,  holding  her  hand  against  her 
side  and  looking  at  Mrs.  Jackson.'  "I  hope  none  of  those 
Belgians  come  to-day.  I  shall  laugh  in  their  faces." 

"What  could  the  poor  man  do?"  expostulated  De  Boyar. 
"He  did  not  wish  to  be  engaged,  so  since  a  friend  had  made 
the  way  in  for  him,  he  himself  had  to  make  the  way  out. 
That  is  what  he  will  say!" 

"But,"  said  the  square-looking  American  secretary,  "look- 
ing at  it  seriously,  that  girl's  too  young.  She  can't  be  more 
than  sixteen  and  she  looks  about  fourteen." 

There  were  some  protesting  murmurs — several  knew  her 
exact  age.  She  was  much  older  than  she  looked.  . 

"That's  nothing,"  interposed  Mrs.  Hopeful.  "My  mother 
was  married  at  five." 

"At  five!"  exclaimed  every  one  incredulously.  "You  must 
be  a  Hindoo!" 

"No,"  explained  Mrs.  Hopeful,  smiling  gleefully.  "I  do 
not,  of  course,  know  it  for  a  fact,  but  I  know  it  by  simple 
arithmetic.  She  was  only  thirty  when  I  was  twenty-four — 
at  least  that  was  what  I  always  heard.  Now,  twenty-four 
from  thirty — with  the  necessary  allowance." 

"How  naughty  of  you!"  protested  Baroness  Waffen, 
looking  over  the  verandah.  She  was  trying  to  see  down 
the  avenue.  People  never  came  until  very  late  here;  but 
when  they  began  to  arrive  they  always  seemed  to  pour  in  all 
together.  This  quiet  would  soon  be  disturbed  and  their 
present  sans-gene  would  give  place  to  dull  solemnity. 

De  Boyar  had  begun  whispering  something  to  the  American 
secretary  which  was  evidently  only  intended  for  manly  ears, 
so  the  four  women  on  the  verandah  drew  together. 

"How  are  you  getting  on  at  that  awful  little  hotel?" 
inquired  Mrs.  Jackson.  Mrs.  Jackson  was  not  only  rather 
severe-looking  but  was  to-day  in  a  bad  temper.  So  Baroness 


294  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

Waffen  tried  to  catch  the  eye  of  the  little  Englishwoman 
before  it  was  too  late,  but  unfortunately  she  failed. 

Mrs.  Hopeful  had  merely  shrugged  her  shoulders  as  an 
opening. 

"It  is  rather  more  interesting  just  now  than  it  was  at 
first,"  she  commented ;  "we  are  getting  to  know  one  another. 
For  instance,  we  had  quite  a  funny  little  dinner  a  night  or 
two  ago." 

"Oh?"  said  Mrs.  Jackson.  The  question-mark  in  her  voice 
imperatively  demanded  further  details. 

"Well,"  explained  Mrs.  Hopeful,  "  we  are  aH  concession- 
naires  more  or  less,  and  we  are  trying  to  stop  being  suspicious 
of  one  another.  Now  that  the  battleship  and  arms-men  have 
left,  there  is  not  such  a  warlike  feeling  in  the  air." 

"There  is,  for  instance,  that  awful  Mr.  Lorenzo,  whom  I 
know,"  remarked  Mrs.  Jackson. 

Mrs.  Hopeful  smiled  sweetly.  The  catting  was  commenc- 
ing. She  was  glad  her  Jack  was  far  away. 

"He  was  with  us  that  evening  I  just  spoke  of.  He  is  not 
really  so  awful,"  she  reflected  aloud.  "He  is  at  least  orig- 
inal and  very  amusing  when  he  wants  to  be." 

"A  man  who  uses  such  qualities  of  scent,"  commented 
Mrs.  Jackson  severely.  She  would  have  liked  to  have  said 
something  further. 

"Perhaps  he  does  that  to  keep  away  our  awful  Peking 
smells,"  suggested  Baroness  Waffen  amiably.  "Even  a 
man  needs  scent  here." 

The  Baroness  had  heard  Mrs.  Jackson  on  the  subject 
of  Lorenzo  before,  and  frankly  it  bored  her.  It  was  said 
that  Lorenzo,  in  an  attempt  to  make  himself  agreeable, 
had  one  day,  after  the  Italian  manner,  suddenly  assured 
Mrs.  Jackson  that  she  was  beautiful — a  statement  which 
was  so  startlingly  impossible  that  she  had  treated  it  as  an 
impertinence. 

"Well,"  continued  Mrs.  Hopeful,  hoping  to  get  on  safer 
ground,  "there  is  a  Mr.  Kerr  who  is  rather  nice.  And  then 


THE   HUMAN    COBWEB  295 

there  are  several  other  agreeable  men,  and  a  very  attractive 
woman,  Madame  Boisragon." 

"Who  is  this  Mr.  Kerr?"  inquired  Mrs.  Jackson,  mentally 
reserving  Madame  Boisragon  for  the  next  onslaught. 

Mrs.  Hopeful  laughed.  This  form  of  conversation  always 
amused  her. 

"Really,  I  don't  know  much  about  him,  excepting  that  he 
is  quite  easy  to  talk  to,"  she  replied.  "He  has  also  appar- 
ently a  marvellous  credit  at  the  bank — so  Jack  says." 

"Oh !"  said  Mrs.  Jackson  in  a  most  peculiar  tone,  suddenly 
frowning.  Mrs.  Hopeful  coloured  pink.  The  last  words 
had  slipped  from  her  quite  inadvertently.  She  could  have 
killed  Mrs.  Jackson.  There  ensued  one  of  those  silences 
which  are  more  eloquent  than  words.  Even  De  Boyar 
shifted  his  feet  several  times. 

"I  have  not  yet  met  that  Madame  Boisragon,"  said  Baroness 
Waffen,  coming  to  the  rescue.  The  other  women  stood  in 
such  fear  and  trembling  of  Mrs.  Jackson  that  now  they 
dared  not  speak.  "Why  doesn't  she  call?" 

"Perhaps  she  will  come  to-day,"  replied  Mrs.  Hopeful, 
recovering  herself  quickly.  "I  admire  her  so  much,  and 
I  would  really  like  you  to  know  her." 

Mrs.  Reid,  a  pretty  little  woman  who  hardly  ever  said  two 
words,  was  just  about  to  make  some  remark,  when  Mrs. 
Jackson  took  the  words  out  of  her  mouth. 

"Has  Madame  Boisragon  a  husband?"  she  inquired  with 
marked  emphasis. 

Mrs.  Hopeful  had  now  entirely  recovered  herself.  Indeed, 
she  now  showed  such  marvellous  control  of  her  features 
that  whilst  her  big,  strange  eyes  were  glittering  angrily,  the 
rest  of  her  face  was-  quite  pleasant. 

"A  husband?"  she  echoed.  "Oh,  dear  me,  yes — quite  like 
all  of  us — that  is,  occasionally." 

Baroness  Waffen  hid  a  smile  in  her  tea-cup.  This  little 
woman,  after  all,  could  protect  herself:  she  would  leave  her 
to  fight  it  out;  alone. 


296  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

"Occasionally,"  repeated  Mrs.  Jackson,  as  if  in  doubt. 
Mrs.  Hopeful  stiffened  and  suddenly  leaned  forward.  She 
had  caught  her. 

"Well,  you  see,"  she  said  sweetly,  "husbands  are  such 
wilful  things,  are  they  not?  They  come,  they  go — and 
sometimes  they  even  forget  us  completely.  How  much  poor 
wives  are  to  be  pitied — sometimes  Mrs.  Jackson." 

Fortunately  De  Boyar,  catching  Baroness  Waffen's  eye, 
suddenly  jumped  up  with  theatrical  effect.  They  were 
afraid  that  Mrs.  Hopeful  would  show  herself  a  little  terror. 

"The  invasion  is  about  to  commence,"  he  cried,  addressing 
them  all.  "The  quiet  and  peace  and  happiness  are  all  over. 
Here  comes  the  beginning  of  the  crowd." 

He  pointed  out  over  the  verandah.  Two  or  three  carts  had 
arrived,  as  well  as  a  Hongkong  mountain-chair  and  several 
people  on  foot. 

Mrs.  Jackson,  crimson  with  rage,  got  up  to  say  good-bye. 
Everybody  knew  that  once  she  had  been  completely  aban- 
doned for  two  whole  years  by  the  estimable  Mr.  Jackson 
and  that  only  force  majeure  had  made  him  ever  return.  A 
most  peculiar  scar  running  down  the  back  of  her  neck,  people 
said,  was  the  permanent  record  of  his  good-bye  pat!  As  a 
matter  of  fact,  Mrs.  Jackson  had  really  fallen  through  a 
window  once  and  nearly  cut  her  neck  off,  without  the  inter- 
vention of  Mr.  Jackson  at  all,  but  nobody  wanted  to  believe 
that.  She  now  swept  off  the  verandah  without  paying  the 
slightest  attention  to  Mrs.  Hopeful.  There  were  sighs  of 
relief. 

"Cat!"  exclaimed  Mrs.  Hopeful  under  her  breath  as  she 
saw  her  back  disappear. 

"But  it  was  beautiful,"  said  De  Boyar,  coming  forward  at 
once  and  taking  her  by  both  hands  excitedly.  "It  was  lovely: 
it  was  perfect!  Let  me  compliment  you — let  me  tell  you 
what  I  think!  She  needs  that  so  often — about  once  every 
hour.  I  am  sure  she  will  tell  the  others  about  my  Belgian 
story.  But  never  mind,  never  mind.  We  are  all  revenged 
in  advance — thanks  to  you,  Mrs.  Hopeful,  thanks  to  you." 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  297 

"Don't  go  yet,  my  dear,"  urged  Baroness  Waffen,  who  had 
got  up.  "Wait  and  see  some  other  people."  She  was 
delighted  that  Mrs.  Jackson  had  been  taught  that  other 
people  have  claws  as  well.  Smilingly  she  forced  Mrs.  Hope- 
ful to  sit  down  once  more. 

The  stream  of  people  began  coming  in.  No  sooner  had  the 
first  batch  arrived  than  others  followed  as  if  by  some  pre- 
arranged signal.  The  verandah  and  drawing-rooms 
resounded  soon  with  a  veritable  babel  of  languages,  but  with 
French,  the  fast  dying  tongue  of  diplomacy,  and  English, 
the  new  lingua  franca  of  the  whole  world,  plainly  fighting 
for  final  mastery.  Baroness  Waffen,  busy  shaking  hands 
and  getting  things  for  people  to  eat  and  drink,  still  found 
time  to  gossip. 

"Sometimes  I  think,"  she  murmured  to  Mrs.  Hopeful, 
who  stayed  by  her,  "that  people  starve  themselves  here  until 
tea-time  in  order  to  have  big  appetites.  Some  of  them  must 
be  mean!  Watch  me  with  this  young  man." 

She  crossed  over  to  where  a  rather  ugly  old  young  man 
was  talking  bad  French  to  an  elderly  lady  who  was  gingerly 
sipping  a  cup  of  tea  as  if  it  might  conceal  surprises  which 
would  upset  her.  The  old  young  man  was  watching  this 
delicate  performance  with  envious  eyes. 

"Mr.  Trump,"  said  Baroness  Waffen  to  him,  "won't  you 
have  anything — a  cup  of  tea  or  a  piece  of  cake?" 

Mr.  Trump  almost  jumped  in  his  anxiety. 

"Thank  you,  thank  you,"  he  said  earnestly,  "that  would  be 
very,  very  nice."  He  followed  the  Baroness  to  the 
tea-table  with  alacrity.  She  cut  him  an  enormous  piece  of 
cake,  which  she  put  on  a  plate  as  if  he  were  a  schoolboy. 
With  this  and  a  cup  of  tea  in  his  hands,  he  beat  a  prompt 
retreat ;  and  sitting  down  in  a  corner  began  to  satisfy  himself 
with  bulging  eyes. 

"Is  he  not  killing?"  remarked  the  Baroness  presently. 
^Sometimes  he  takes  seven  cups  of  tea  and  simply  piles  of 
sandwiches.  One  wonders  where  it  all  goes  to." 


298  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

She  was  interrupted  by  three  young  girls  coming  bashfully 
forward  in  a  line. 

"Good-afternoon,"  said  the  eldest  in  a  squeaky  voice. 
"Mamma  is  so  sorry  that  she  could  not  come,  but  she  has  a 
bad  headache  and  asks  you  to  excuse  her." 

Baroness  Waffen  smiled  and  murmured  her  regrets. 

The  second  girl,  having  disengaged  herself  from  a  young 
man,  followed  her  sister. 

"How  do  you  do,  Baroness,"  she  said  in  a  more  squeaky 
voice.  "Mamma  is  so  sorry  that  she  could  not  come,  but  she 
has  a  bad  headache  and  asks  you  to  excuse  her." 

Baroness  Waffen's  smile  had  become  a  little  enigmatical. 
The  irrepressible  De  Boyar  having  approached  was  plainly 
listening  to  it  all  with  an  expression  of  intense  delight.  He 
anticipated  the  advance  of  the  third  girl,  who  was  rather 
small,  by  a  sudden  movement. 

"But  your  mother — where  is  your  mother,"  he  said  in  mock 
concern,  "ou  est  maman?" 

The  little  girl,  not  to  be  foiled,  merely  sniggered  at  him  and 
shook  hands  first  with  the  Baroness. 

"Good-afternoon,  madame,"  she  said  in  a  very  squeaky 
voice.  "Mamma  is  so  sorry  that  she  could  not  come,  but  she 
has  a  bad  headache  and  asks  you  to  excuse  her." 

The  Baroness  Waffen  made  a  valiant  effort  and  succeeded 
in  keeping  a  straight  face.  De  Boyar  hardly  waited  until 
the  little  girl  was  out  of  earshot  before  he  began. 

"What  a  pity — what  a  pity  there  are  only  three!  Think 
of  the  dramatic  possibilities  if  there  were  only  more — say 
thirteen — thirteen  all  stretched  in  a  long  queue  one  behind 
the  other  eternally  saying  the  same  thing!  It  would  be  a 
sublime  spectacle — a  splendid  proof  of  the  constancy  existing 
among  people  of  the  same  flesh  and  blood!  I  should  hire 
them  all — become  an  impresario  instead  of  a  diplomat,  and 
conduct  them  over  the  civilized  world  to  delight  dense 
audiences.  Think  of  the  originality — 'Mamma  is  sick, 
mamma  has  a  headache — mamma  is  this — mamma  is  that!'  ' 

"Taisez-VQtu"  said  Baroness  Waffen,  shaking  with  laughter 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  299 

and  tapping  him  on  the  shoulder,  "I  cannot  listen  to  your 
foolishness  all  day.  You  are  truly  an  idiot — go  away. 
Here  come  some  more." 

De  Boyar  discreetly  vanished  as  he  saw  his  Minister 
approach  talking  to  a  Mrs.  Springham.  Mrs.  Springham, 
who  was  newly  wed,  came  from  Sioux  City,  Iowa,  and  was 
already  voted  a  cure  for  the  despondent.  She  had  burst 
into  this  staid  little  world  wTith  an  historic  if  venturesome 
remark.  Seeing  six  children  sitting  all  in  a  row  in  some- 
body's garden,  she  had  inquired  if  they  all  had  the  same 
mother.  On  learning  that  this  was  actually  so,  she  had 
exclaimed  in  mock  terror,  "Gee,  then  this  is  no  climate  for 
me!"  Perhaps  it  \vas  the  rhythm  which  made  the  remark 
so  unforgettable. 

Fortunately  Airs.  Springham  had  much  energy  and  was  a 
good  fighter — qualities  which  have  become  more  than  excel- 
lent in  the  modern  world.  No\v  she  began  an  animated  con- 
versation with  Baroness  Waffen.  Two  or  three  other 
Americans,  attracted  by  the  sound  of  her  voice,  at  once 
came  up,  and  soon  they  were  making  such  a  noise  that 
everybody  near  them  stopped  talking. 

"Why  didn't  you  come,  Baroness?"  said  Airs.  Springham, 
referring  to  a  little  concert  which  had  just  been  given. 
Then,  without  waiting  for  an  answer,  she  w^ent  on: 

"It  wras  just  the  richest  thing  in  the  town,  I  am  sure. 
You  know  the  little  stage  they  always  put  up?  Well, 
those  two  skittish  young  persons  w^ent  on  it,  and  Madame 
Gillatti,  the  hostess,  after  a  pause  followed  them  and  sat 
down  heavily — very  heavily — in  an  armchair  behind  them. 
We  all  thought,  of  course,  she  did  that  just  to  give  them  con- 
fidence, and  thought  it  rather  nice  of  her.  But  about  half- 
way through  their  song  she  got  up  slowly  and  majestically, 
and  before  you  could  say  Jack  Robinson,  there  she  was  boom- 
ing in  a  deep,  chesty  voice,  L'amour,  I'amQur,  and  some 
other  wrords  I  don't  know.  It  so  took*  me  by  surprise  that  I 
just  madly  laughed"  (Mrs.  Springham  pronounced  it  laffed). 
"You  see  it  was  really  a  trio,  and  we  all  thought  it  was  a 


300  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

duet!  As  soon  as  Madame  Gillatti  had  got  through  with 
her  I'amour,  I'amour,  she  sat  down  comfortably  with  a  big 
flop  in  her  armchair  again  as  if  nothing  had  happened.  But 
she  fairly  glared  at  me  all  the  evening  when  she  heard 
about  me.  I  admit  I  was  a  bit  scared,  for  she  is  heavy.  Still, 
it  was  so,  so  funny!  And  then  after  the  concert  they  just 
gave  beer  and  sandwiches  like  on  the  German  mail.  You 
know  we  came  out  from  Paris  via  Suez.  I  thought  that 
beat  everything  for  an  official  entertainment — I  mean  the 
beer  and  ham  sandwiches." 

Baroness  Waffen  passed  her  fingers  through  a  string  of 
jade  Mrs.  Springham  was  wearing. 

"What  pretty  jade,"  she  said. 

"Do  you  like  it?"  answered  Mrs.  Springham  eagerly. 
"Tom  says  I  am  so  foolish  because  I  am  just  buying  up  ev- 
erything I  can  in  this  old  town.  There  is  a  good  deal  to 
buy,  too,  I  find;  but  I  am  fairly  curio-mad,  so  I  must  keep 
on." 

She  went  on  entertaining  them  all  and  sending  them  into 
fits  of  laughter  with  her  spontaneous  sallies. 

The  chorus  of  voices,  whispering,  laughing,  arguing  in 
such  a  medley  of  tongues,  became  suddenly  stilled.  People 
turned  round  in  surprise:  they  said  they  could  hardly  be- 
lieve their  eyes.  Baroness  Waffen's  attention  was  at  once 
attracted.  She  got  up  hastily  from  the  chair  in  which  she 
had  just  seated  herself. 

"It  is  old  Sir  Joshua,  my  dear,"  she  said  to  Mrs.  Hopeful, 
whom  she  had  beckoned  over  to  her.  "You  must  meet  him : 
he  is  our  one  Peking  personality,  and  generally  never  goes 
outside  his  own  garden." 

She  led  the  way  towards  Sir  Joshua,  who,  pausing  to  ex- 
change greetings  with  those  around  him,  was  searching  a  lit- 
tle confusedly  for  his  hostess  with  his  keen  old  eyes. 

"It  is  too  good  of  you  to  come,  Sir  Joshua,"  said  Baroness 
Waffen,  coming  up  to  him.  "I  do  not  deserve  it  in  the 
least." 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  301 

"Oh,  Baroness,"  protested  Sir  Joshua,  shaking  hands  with 
Mrs.  Hopeful  and  smiling  kindly  at  the  little  woman, 
"what  have  I  done  that  you  should  cover  me  with  confu- 


sion 


In  his  shyness  he  coloured  at  his  own  words  and  looked  ner- 
vously about  him.  Sir  Joshua  was  very  slight  and  frail- 
looking;  he  looked,  indeed,  as  if  a  gust  of  wind  would  blow 
him  away.  Yet  though  his  hair  was  so  white  and  his  step 
had  become  wooden,  from  his  eyes  shone  a  peculiarly  bright 
light,  as  if  there  was  within  him  that  which  triumphed  over 
his  many  physical  weaknesses.  Somehow  he  was  very  differ- 
ent from  the  people  around  him. 

After  he  had  exchanged  a  few  commonplaces  with  Mrs. 
Hopeful,  Baroness  Waffen  led  him  to  a  comfortable  chair 
and  made  him  sit  down. 

"I  have  taken  charge  of  you,  Sir  Joshua,"  she  said  confiden- 
tially, plunging  at  once  in  medias  res,  "for  a  very  special 
reason.  I  am  nervous,  and  want  to  know  what  you  really 
think  of  things  political.  What  is  going  to  happen  here?  I 
want  you  to  talk  really  seriously  to  me." 

A  sad  smile  passed  over  Sir  Joshua's  face,  and  his  expres- 
sion entirely  changed  as  she  concluded.  There  appeared  in 
place  of  the  old  gentleman  seeking  only  to  please  his  hostess, 
the  real  Sir  Joshua  weighed  down  by  work  and  much  think- 
ing— and  somewhat  fearful  of  the  future. 

"What  is  going  to  happen?"  he  repeated  mechanically, 
looking  far  away  into  the  distance  and  losing  all  his  nervous- 
ness. "Ah,  if  we  could  only  know!  The  lines  of  fate  are 
crossing  and  recrossing  in  a  puzzling  tangle,  and  no  man 
dares  say  what  may  or  may  not  come.  Sometimes  the  lines 
form  a  perfect  web — a  Chinese  puzzle:  sometimes  they  ap- 
pear as  only  vague  tracings  without  real  meaning." 

He  paused  and  smiled  gently.  He  loved  to  talk  in  meta- 
phors or  in  parables. 

"But  your  opinion,, Sir  Joshua — what  is  your  opinion?"  in- 
sisted Baroness  Waffen.  "It  is  because  I  value  it  so  much 


302  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

that  I  ask  you.  I  do  not  want  a  diplomatic  answer — I  want 
the  truth.  Please!" 

She  looked  at  him  so  appealingly  that  Sir  Joshua  inclined 
his  head  slightly  in  token  of  consent. 

"I  think,"  he  said  slowly,  speaking  so  hesitatingly  that 
there  was  nothing  sententious  in  his  manner,  "that  no  one 
realizes  the  mighty  forces  lying  latent  in  this  great  empire. 
This  lack  of  understanding  is  the  great  danger.  We  up 
here  in  Peking  think  of  China  as  the  possession  of  the  Man- 
chus — a  small  race  of  conquerors  resembling  the  Germanic 
tribe  of  Franks,  who  invaded  Gaul  and  made  the  country 
so  much  their  own  that  it  now  bears  their  name.  But  the 
Franks  had  more  than  a  thousand  years  to  assimilate  them- 
selves to  the  natives  of  Gaul — and  to  make  them  acknowl- 
edge their  rule.  The  Manchus  only  came  to  their  own  two 
and  a  half  centuries  ago,  and  still  form  a  separate  clan — a 
separate  people  entrenched  in  and  around  Peking.  In  the 
last  sixty  years  these  Manchus  have  been  humbled  again  and 
again  by  us — by  Europe — and  now  they  realize  that  their 
cup  is  full.  People  have  never  realized  how  bitter  all  the 
wars  since  the  Canton  days  have  been  to  them.  Even  this 
nation  has  hardly  known  of  these  things — though  the  Man- 
chus have  understood.  Yet  when  the  nation  realizes  that  it 
is  really  one  homogeneous  whole,  as  the  French  people  in- 
stinctively did  at  the  end  of  the  eighteenth  century — that 
Manchu  conquerors  and  conquered  Chinese  are  only  historic 
terms,  and  that  the  outer  peril,  the  foreigner,  is  the  great 
peril — then'we  may  see  what  no  one  can  imagine." 

"You  mean?"  said  Baroness  Waffen  intently.  She  was  glad 
that  no  one  was  listening  to  them. 

"I  mean,"  replied  Sir  Joshua  in  a  low  voice,  "that  in  time 
there  will  be  millions  of  men  in  serried  ranks  and  war's 
panoply  at  the  call  of 'the  Chinese  government — of  the  Man- 
chus— there  cannot  be  the  slightest  doubt  of  that!  And  if 
the  Chinese  government  continues  to  exist,  it  will  encour- 
age, and  will  be  quite  right  to  encourage,  uphold,  and  de- 
velop this  national  movement:  it  bodes  no  good  for  the  rest 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  303 

of  the  world,  but  China  will  be  acting  within  her  right  and 
will  carry  through  the  national  programme  which  is  slowly 
but  surely  being  mapped  out.  I  mean  that  these  Palace  in- 
trigues and  various  movements  now  going  on  have  only  an 
inner  meaning  and  no  outward  meaning — and  that  we 
should  not  deceive  ourselves.  Things  must  march  on  to 
their  natural  end,  and  all  the  pin-pricking  and  slicing  of  this 
year  of  1898  can  only  bring  one  reward." 

"Oh,"  said  Baroness  Waffen,  leaning  back  and  fanning 
herself  rapidly,  "the  very  words  I  have  used  again  and  again 
to  my  husband.  And  yet  he  only  laughs  and  says  that  when 
the  time  comes  our  government  will  know  how  to  deal  with 
such  developments." 

Sir  Joshua  did  not  answer.  He  appeared  to  be  studying  the 
laughing  crowd.  Perhaps  he  was  a  little  sorry  that  he  had 
said  so  much. 

"But  suppose  the  Manchus  are  beaten  again,"  continued 
the  Baroness,  anxious  to  learn  everything  she  could,  "do  you 
think  they  will  really  retreat  into  Manchuria  in  a  vast  horde 
— men,  women,  and  children,  as  some  people  think — that 
they  will  run  away  this  time?  Think  of  all  those  pretty 
painted  women,  in  their  gorgeous  silks  and  satins  and  fan- 
tastic head-dresses,  being  lost  in  a  desert!" 

Sir  Joshua  smiled. 

"The  era  of  great  migrations  is  long  passed,"  he  said.  "No 
disasters  can  possibly  make  it  return.  The  only  retreat  for 
these  people  will  be  down  wells  and  into  rivers!  It  is  ter- 
rible to  think  of  what  may  happen." 

"But  why  cannot  we  stop  all  this?"  cried  Baroness  Waf- 
fen, shuddering. 

"Ask  your  husband,"  said  Sir  Joshua,  looking  at  her  in  a 
peculiar  way.  "We  are  being  forced  along  a  precipitous 
path." 

"Baroness,  Baroness,"  cried  a  young  lady,  rushing  up  ex- 
citedly, "you  cannot  stay  there  any  longer.  We  want  your 
opinion.  It  is  about  the  Empress  Dowager.  Haven't  Sec- 
retaries' wives  a  right  to  be  presented  just  as  much  as  Minis- 
ters' wives  ?  Isn't  it  a  shame  that  they  are  trying  to  exclude 


304  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

us?  They  say  it  is  a  new  rule.  I  do  so  want  to  see  the  Em- 
press Dowager.  Come,  give  us  your  opinion  quickly." 

The  young  lady  made  Baroness  Waffen,  who  was  very 
good-natured,  get  up.  Sir  Joshua  rose  as  well. 

"What  I  have  said  is  only  for  you,  Baroness,"  he  whis- 
pered quickly. 

"Of  course,  of  course,  dear  Sir  Joshua.  A  diplomat's  wife 
understands  that  much,"  she  replied  as  she  hurried  off. 

Mrs.  Hopeful  was  disappointed.  Madame  Boisragon  did 
not  come  as  she  had  hoped,  and  as  everybody  was  now  going 
she  also  made  her  farewells,  in  spite  of  Baroness  Waffen's 
entreaties  to  stay.  Men  who  had  been  riding  or  playing 
tennis  were  now  waiting  outside  on  the  verandahs  for  their 
cold  drinks,  and  the  Baroness  wanted  Mrs.  Hopeful's  help 
to  entertain  them.  But  the  little  woman  was  resolute  this 
time:  she  simply  must  go,  she  said. 

Outside  she  found  her  old  carter  curled  up  in  the  cart  fast 
asleep.  She  had  been  so  long! 

"Wake  up,  old  man,"  she  said,  poking  him  merrily  with 
her  parasol.  "Wake  up,  wake  up.  At  length  the  great  or- 
deal is  over." 

The  carter  arose  with  a  start  and  climbed  down. 

"Lao-la,  lao-la — I  am  old,"  he  said  apologetically,  taking 
up  the  reins  and  coughing  slowly.  "I  am  old — very  old." 

When  they  reached  the  hotel  Mr.  Smith  was  at  the  en- 
trance waiting  for 'her.  Mrs.  Hopeful  was  pleasantly  dis- 
appointed. He  was  not  at  all  bad-tempered.  He  had  had  a 
long  and  interesting  talk,  he  said,  with  Lorenzo,  who  had 
just  left  for  up-country  and  would  be  away  for  some  days. 
Madame  Boisragon  had  gone  out  with  Kerr,  he  added,  some 
time  ago. 

"Oh!"  commented  Mrs.  Hopeful  monosyllabically. 

Behind  her  parasol  she  made  a  little  grimace  and  gave  a 
peculiar  little  muffled  whistle — things  which  were  not  good 
for  Mr.  Smith  to  perceive. 

For  Mrs.  Hopeful  was  wondering — oh,  yes,  she  was  won- 
dering a  good  deal  about  his  second  remark. 


CHAPTER  XX 

"Tout  le  monde  se  plaint  de  sa  memoire,  et  per- 
sonne  ne  se  plaint  de  son  jugement." — LA  ROCHE- 
FOUCAULD. 

WHEN  Lorenzo  and  Peter  Kerr  met  again  a  few  days  later, 
both  men  were  instinctively  conscious  that  in  the  interval 
their  relationship  to  each  other  had  grievously  suffered.  By 
some  subtle  process  they  had  sheered  off  from  each  other, 
had  somehow  become  less  intimate.  Kerr  was  undoubtedly 
ill  at  ease;  and  Lorenzo,  examining  the  man  with  the  eye 
of  the  expert,  said  to  himself  in  his  expressive  Italian  way, 
"The  devil !  This  woman  has  him  tight  by  the  hair !" 

Lorenzo  was  also  manifestly  annoyed  to  find  that  Kerr  had 
done  next  to  nothing  in  his  absence;  he  had  apparently  oc- 
cupied himself  in  waiting  for  his*  return,  and  had  not  found 
that  process  half  as  wearisome  as  he  would  have  in  the  past. 
The  one  thing  he  had  unquestionably  done,  Lorenzo  discov- 
ered after  some  questioning,  was  to  reply  to  unexpected  cor- 
respondence with  his  own  Legation.  The  Italian  on  read- 
ing these  letters  was  instantly  convinced  that  it  would  have 
been  far  better  in  this  case  if  Kerr  had  done  nothing.  It 
was  immediately  evident  to  Lorenzo  that  Kerr's  English 
competitors  had  somehow  got  wind  of  the  steps  he  had  al- 
ready taken  in  conjunction  with  him,  and  being  probably 
alarmed  at  the  idea  that  he — Lorenzo — had  been  enlisted  to 
work  against  them,  they  were  now  bringing  pressure  to  bear 
very  cleverly  so  as  to  discourage  Kerr  from  making  further 
independent  efforts  of  this  nature.  Thus  the  Minister  had 
stated  in  one  letter  that,  being  duly  instructed  to  that  effect 
from  London,  it  would  be  impossible  for  him  now  to  sup- 
port in  any  way  projects  of  which  the  details  were  not  fully 
communicated  to  him  in  advance;  and  that  further,  seeing 


3o6  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

that  only  harm  could  come  from  rival  schemes  being  laid  be- 
fore the  Chinese  government  by  competing  British  syndi- 
cates, it  would  be  incumbent  on  him,  as  Her  Majesty's  rep- 
resentative, should  the  occasion  for  so  doing  arise,  to  point 
out  clearly  to  the  Peking  authorities  that  Mr.  Kerr's  pro- 
jects were  purely  private  and  in  no  way  supported  by  Down- 
ing Street.  Lorenzo  was  immensely  annoyed  at  the  turn 
Kerr's  affairs  had  taken;  and  for  once  he  made  no  attempt 
to  conceal  his  irritation. 

"You  should  have  formally  acknowledged  receipt  of  these 
letters  and  said  not  one  word  more,"  he  concluded  after  a 
lot  of  talk,  frowning  and  fidgeting  with  his  hands.  "The 
very  wording  is  the  same  used  every  month  of  the  year.  I 
have  had  trouble  in  the  same  way  myself,  and  I  have  pro- 
tected myself  only  by  treating  such  correspondence  as  an  in- 
trusion on  my  private  affairs.  The  whole  stand  taken  by 
European  officialdom  in  China  is  ridiculous  and  must  lead 
to  trouble.  What  right  have  they  to  meddle?  We  are  not 
children!" 

His  own  business  being  so  nearly  concluded,  he  felt  par- 
ticularly annoyed  at  Kerr's  lack  of  confidence  in  his  meth- 
ods. He  was  certain  that  it  was  bad  on  principle  to  show  a 
single  card  in  such  a  complex  game  as  was  now  proceeding; 
and  here  was  his  friend  and  ally  apparently  willing  to  dis- 
cuss his  whole  hand  with  the  first-comer  because  he  was  an 
official!  He  began  lecturing  him  again:  there  was  no  end 
to  the  things  Lorenzo  said. 

Still,  with  all  this,  when  Kerr  had  heard  him  through  he 
merely  shrugged  his  shoulders  and  lazily  lighted  a  cigarette. 
Then  the  blood  rushed  to  Lorenzo's  face,  and  he  suddenly 
shifted  his  view  of  the  whole  situation.  Very  good,  this  fel- 
low was  contented:  he  was  amusing  himself:  he  had  fallen 
into  the  comfortable  frame  of  mind  of  believing  that  fortune 
might  be  wooed  and  won  like  a  woman.  He  would  show 
him  the  contrary — by  degrees. 

For  a  moment  Lorenzo,  so  incensed  was  he,  was  inclined 
to  blurt  out  something  indiscreet.  His  Italian  caution,  how- 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  307 

ever,  soon  got  the  better  of  him;  so,  instead  of  speaking  any 
more  just  then,  he  closed  his  lips  tight  together  after  his  pe- 
culiar mannerism  and  steadily  studied  the  floor. 

He  decided  in  a  very  few  seconds  how  he  would  act.  He 
could  not  afford  the  risk  of  a  rupture,  since  Kerr's  bank- 
account  was  at  his  disposal.  Also,  he  had  a  sort  of  profes- 
sional pride  which  forbade  such  stupid  tactics,  since  a  con- 
cessionnaire  is  the  man  of  all  men  who  must  know  how  to 
meet  every  possible  situation,  who  must  be  a  master — im- 
proviser — in  fact,  an  improvisator *e,  composing  and  reciting 
verses  without  preparation. 

So  suddenly  Lorenzo  smiled.  Then  he  looked  up  as  if  an 
engaging  idea  had  struck  him. 

"It  will  be  rather  funny,"  he  said  easily,  "if  in  the  end  this 
develops  into  a  three-cornered  or  even  a  four-cornered  fight. 
If  it  does,  we  might  easily  arrange  a  compromise." 

As  if  to  give  point  to  his  thought,  he  began  lazily 
arranging  three  or  four  matches  round  a  match-box  on  the 
small  table  which  separated  him  from  his  companion,  shift- 
ing the  matches  this  way  and  that  and  finally  breaking  them 
into  pieces. 

"What  do  you  mean?"  inquired  Peter  Kerr,  coming  dis- 
contentedly back  to  the  point  and  groaning  inwardly  at  his 
companion's  unwearying  persistence.  He  wondered  how  it 
was  that  he  never  got  tired  of  the  same  eternal  subject. 

"I  mean,"  said  Lorenzo  very  deliberately,  as  if  he  were 
thinking  aloud,  "that  very  possibly  you  may  soon  see  your 
way  to  giving  up  a  portion  of  your  scheme  to  the  French  and 
Belgians,  and  then  in  combination  with  them  I  am  abso- 
lutely certain  that  we  could  defeat  all  comers.  If  you 
thought  such  a  thing  possible,  I  might  save  time  and  trou- 
ble by  beginning  now  to  see  how  it  would  work  out.  For 
instance,  all  these  lines  north  of  the  Yang-tse  River  have 
been  roughly  surveyed — you  have  your  first  figures — you 
might  do  worse  than  join  forces,  you  know.  It  is  quite  pos- 
sible that  it  could  be  arranged.  I  see  a  way." 

Kerr  sat  up  suddenly,  as  Lorenzo  stopped.    Then,  for  some 


3o8  THE   HUMAN    COBWEB 

reason,  he  took  off  his  straw  hat.  They  were  sitting  in  the 
hotel  hall  with  lemon  squashes  in  tall  tumblers  beside  them; 
and  apart  from  the  usual  drowsing  servants  on  the  corri- 
dor benches  there  appeared  not  a  soul  within  sight  or  hear- 
ing. 

"Do  you  realize,"  said  Kerr,  grasping  the  crown  of  his 
straw  hat  between  his  hands  and  looking  squarely  at  the 
Italian,  "do  you  realize  what  this  scheme  means  to  me? 
Have  I  not  told  you  again  and  again  that  it  has  long  been 
my  great  idea,  and  that  to  throw  up  the  sponge  in  the  way 
you  suggest  is  absolutely  impossible?" 

"I  realize  it  and  yet  I  do  not  realize  it,"  answered  the 
Italian  cryptically.  He  toyed  with  his  black  beard  with  a 
peculiar  studied  indifference  which  was  very  insolent. 

"What  do  you  mean  ?" 

Peter  Kerr,  being  physically  somewhat  tired,  was  mentally 
irritated.  It  would  require  very  little  to  make  him  openly 
angry. 

Lorenzo  looked  at  him  very  calmly  and  showed  no  trace 
of  embarrassment.  Lorenzo  was  not  an  athletic  figure — as 
a  matter  of  fact  he  was  distinctly  fat — but  he  was  a  singu- 
larly brave  man  in  his  own  peculiar  way,  and  he  cared  as  lit- 
tle for  the  consequences  of  his  speeches  as  he  did  for  the 
legions  of  summer  flies  now  climbing  up  and  down  the  ho- 
tel walls.  Also  he  was  very  deliberate.  So  now  he  picked 
his  words  as  he  spoke. 

"I  will  explain.  What  I  mean  is  not  hard  to  understand. 
You  say  that  this  scheme  of  yours — which  to  my  non-tech- 
nical eyes  is  really  admirable — is  your  great  idea.  You  also 
say  that  under  no  circumstances  will  you  modify  it  so  long 
as  you  are  not  openly  beaten.  All  this  I  realize  as  being  un- 
doubtedly so — originally,  mark  my  words,  originally.  Just 
now,  however,  I  am  unable  to  realize  that  you" — he  paused 
and  sought  for  the  word — "adhere,  that  is  the  word — that 
you  adhere  completely  to  your  original  scheme.  You  do 
not  show  the  vigour  and  singleness  of  purpose  which  I  have 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  309 

explained  are  all  necessary  in  Peking  for  success — diplomatic 
success.  Perhaps  I  am  not  very  plain ;  but  that  is  because  I 
am  not  speaking  in  my  own  language." 

"Oh,"  ejaculated  Peter  Kerr  a  little  irrelevantly  at  the  end 
of  this  long  speech,  in  a  tone  of  singular  relief,  "oh,  well, 
perhaps  I  have  been  rather  slack.  Perhaps  you  are  right." 

The  Italian  raised  his  long  glass  to  his  mouth  so  as  to  hide 
a  smile.  Of  course  the  other  had  thought  that  he  would 
make  some  blunt  reference:  that  would  have  doubtless  been 
the  English  way.  Lorenzo  took  a  wholly  unnecessary  time 
to  swallow  the  little  he  drank,  and  when  he  set  down  his 
tumbler  he  had  decided  that  for  the  moment  he  had  gone  far 
enough. 

He  got  up  and  looked  at  his  watch. 

"Then  it  is  agreed  that  in  any  case  no  more  replies  are  sent 
to  the  Legation?"  he  said  lightly.  "Meanwhile,  I  will  take 
up  the  threads  where  I  left  them  and  try  to  discover  what 
has  actually  happened.  Au  revoir!' 

They  parted  almost  cheerfully.  Yet,  as  Lorenzo  knew 
would  be  the  case,  Kerr  went  away  with  a  frown  on  his  face 
and  self-anger  in  his  heart.  Within  a  very  few  days  the 
Italian  believed  he  would  win  his  point  by  introducing  cer- 
tain new  complications  into  the  game.  Yet  even  his  fertile 
brain  could  not  have  invented  the  strange  revenges  which 
were  even  then  being  prepared  by  the  whirligig  of  time.  But 
in  any  case  he  made  up  his  mind  that  he  had  done  his  duty. 

Carnot,  coming  out  of  his  office  a  few  minutes  after  this, 
stopped  suddenly  in  front  of  two  hall-boys  who  were  laugh- 
ing and  whispering  to  each  other. 

"What  is  it?"  he  inquired  gruffly,  in  a  way  which  always 
made  his  servants  tell  the  approximate  truth. 

The  two  men  looked  at  each  other  and  then  one  said  in 
the  vernacular : 

"Whilst  the  Italian  and  the  Englishman  were  talking  here 
just  now,  No.  6  was  in  the  room  here." 


3io  THE   HUMAN    COBWEB 

The  servant  pointed  to  the  open  door  of  the  little  private 
dining-room.  A  screen  inside  the  door  would  hide  any  one 
from  view.1 

"Well?"  said  Carnot. 

The  boy  resumed: 

"When  the  Italian  and  the  Englishman  had  finished,  No. 
6  put  his  head  out  to  see  whether  they  had  gone  and  then 
suddenly  rushed  out." 

"Salop"  commented  Carnot  reflectively,  walking  on. 

He  did  not  like  No.  6  at  all.  He  was  a  new  arrival — a 
young  Belgian  mixed  up  with  Boisragon's  syndicate,  he  was 
sure,  for  he  had  overheard  him  talking  confidentially  with 
Madame  Boisragon. 

Carnot  wondered  whether  he  should  tell  Lorenzo  about  the 
incident/  Then  he  decided  not  to  do  so;  it  would  lead  to 
nothing  and  might  make  trouble. 

By  such  trifles  are  great  things  decided. 


CHAPTER  XXI 

"La  duree  de  nos  passions  ne  depend  pas  plus 
de  nous  que  la  duree  de  notre  vie." — LA  ROCHE- 
FOUCAULD. 

IT  seemed  to  Peter  Kerr,  on  the  very  evening  of  the  day 
on  which  he  had  this  serious  talk  with  Lorenzo,  that  Ma- 
dame Boisragon  was  more  reserved  towards  him.  He  could 
not  understand  the  reason  why.  Several  times  he  asked  her 
what  was  the  matter,  and  each  time  she  gave  a  different  an- 
swer. 

"My  dear  man,"  she  said  finally,  "you  are  too  exacting. 
What  can  it  matter  to  you  if  I  feel  thoughtful  ?" 

"It  is  true  I  may  not  be  able  to  cure  it,"  he  replied  smil- 
ingly, "but  perhaps  I  can  relieve  it." 

To  this  she  merely  shrugged  her  shoulders.  All  that  even- 
ing she  remained  in  the  same  curious  frame  of  mind,  and 
there  was  now  somehow  born  in  him  the  unenviable  feeling 
that  he  had  rushed  in  where  angels  fear  to  tread.  .  .  . 

Two  days  later  there  was  something  else — a  letter  from 
England. 

The  letter  came  as  fateful  letters  always  come,  carried  un- 
concernedly by  an  unfeeling  hand,  when  the  contents  may 
be  a  bombshell  blowing  up  a  Fool's  Paradise  and  bringing 
one  face  down  on  Mother  Earth — or  a  lodestar,  guiding 
one's  footsteps  back  to  forgotten  regions.  Some  one  has  al- 
ready written  on  the  strange  modern  miracle  of  the  postal 
pillar-box  which  permits  a  person  at  one  end  of  the  world 
unerringly  to  find  the  person  at  the  other  end  whether  he 
desires  it  or  not,  by  the  simple  act  of  dropping  a  letter 
through  a  slit.  It  is  really  rather  wonderful  that  Fate 
should  have  such  a  cunning  way  of  serving  writs. 

Peter  Kerr  took  this  particular  envelope  and  examined  it  as 


3i2  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

carefully  as  the  illiterate  do  when  the  postman  brings  them 
news.  Almost  suspiciously  he  balanced  it  in  his  hand.  He 
noted  the  postmarks  carefully,  and  calculated  the  time  it  had 
taken  to  travel  from  London  to  Peking — forty-four  days — 
and  then  finally  turned  his  attention  to  the  handwriting.  It 
was,  of  course,  a  woman's  handwriting,  yet  for  some  reason 
he  did  not  recognize  it  at  once.  The  tall,  defiant  lettering 
somehow  attracted  him;  and  for  a  few  fleeting  seconds  he 
idly  wondered  whether  handwriting  was  really  any  clue  to 
character. 

He  tore  open  the  envelope  and  began  to  read.  The  ex- 
pression on  his  face  was  soon  not  unlike  that  of  a  man  who 
has  surrendered  himself  to  his  dentist.  Yet  the  letter  was 
curiously  terse,  curiously  impersonal,  curiously  restrained. 
It  was  nothing  to  make  a  man  gloomy.  It  read : 

DEAR  MR.  KERR:  It  seems  years  since  I  received  your  brief 
farewell  note  in  London,  and  I  have  felt  that  before  now  I  should 
have  perhaps  sent  you  a  line  in  reply. 

How  is  the  world,  I  wonder,  treating  you  in  the  mysterious 
Beyond  where  your  business  has  called  you?  My  ideas  not  only 
of  geography  but  of  strange  peoples  are  admirably  vague,  and 
China  is  to  me  the  land  of  tea-chests  and  pig-tailed  people,  and 
nothing  else.  Sir  James  Barker  says  that  you  are  still  living 
in  Peking,  and  from  this — as  I  do  know  the  capital  of  the  country — 
I  suppose  your  great  scheme  still  demands  your  unremitting 
attention. 

I  have  tried  to  picture  to  myself  what  the  country  is  like,  but  I 
have  only  come  across  one  book  which  attempts  to  describe  it, 
and  that  has  left  me  more  fogged  than  ever.  It  is  a  book  by  a 
woman  who  gives  the  names  of  the  people  who  helped  her  on  her 
road,  and  who,  though  she  is  careful  to  mention  the  exact  hour 
she  starts  every  day,  and  how  she  feels  getting  up  so  early, 
forgets  to  mention  much  else !  Why  are  there  so  many  idiots  in 
the  world? 

I  suppose  in  Peking  you  are  living  practically  a  la  chinoise,  and 
that  there  is  hardly  a  soul  to  speak  to.  It  must  be  dull  for  you. 
I  have  learnt  that  it  is  a  remarkably  dirty  city  but  interestingly 
barbaric. 

I  can  think  of  no  scrap  of  news  from  here  of  any  particular  inter- 
est to  you.  We  are  doing  approximately  the  same  as  we  always 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  313 

do— and  things  are  by  no  means  exciting.  Mrs.  John  West  has 
given  several  very  successful  parties  lately,  and  they  say  that 
John  West  has  made  another  pile  in  South  Africans,  which 
enables  them  to  spend  money  like  water.  A  month  ago,  being 
rather  tired  of  the  same  eternal  round,  mother  and  I  flitted  across 
to  the  Continent  and  had  two  weeks  in  Spain.  The  Alhambra 
and  Seville  are  simply  lovely,  but  oh,  the  hotels!  It  seems  silly 
to  tell  you  anything  in  detail,  as  by  the  time  my  letter  reaches 
you  you  may  be  on  your  way  home  or  have  disappeared  some- 
where else.  Besides,  I  am  quite  sure  that,  like  most  people  of 
to-day,  I  can  talk  much  better  than  I  can  write. 

If  I  can  do  anything  for  you,  let  me  know.  I  have  acres  of 
time  but  nothing  to  cultivate,  and  so  the  tares  of  laziness  are 
growing  up  apace.  Does  that  sound  subtle  or  silly? 

Good-bye. 

Yours  very  sincerely, 

PHYLLIS  MAY. 

p.S. — We  may  go  to  Canada  in  the  summer,  and  I  should  dearly 
love  to  go  right  around  the  world — or  at  least  to  Japan.  How  far 
is  Japan  from  China? 

That  was  all. 

Peter  Kerr  read  the  letter  three  times  before  he  laid  it 
down.  Then,  as  he  was  replacing  it  in  its  envelope,  he 
changed  his  mind  and  looked  at  it  again,  only  to  lean  back 
in  his  chair  with  a  very  curious  look  on  his  face. 

"Confound  everything!"  he  said  a  little  irrelevantly  at 
last,  starting  irritably  to  his  feet  and  crushing  his  corre- 
spondence carelessly  into  his  pockets. 

People  were  always  saying  the  world  was  very  small:  he 
imagined  that  he  was  living  millions  of  miles  away  from 

everything;  and  here  was  the  chance He  broke  off  his 

thoughts,  only  to  begin  again. 

Still,  there  was  nothing  in  the  letter.  He  wondered  why 
women  always  wrote  like  that,  saying  so  much  by  what  they 
left  unsaid. 

It  was  a  horrid  trait :  it  was  a  little  cruel,  and  certainly  un- 
kind. 

Damn ! 

He  gazed  moodily  through  the  green  bamboo  blinds  at  tHc 


3H  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

street  below,  watching  the  heavy  wheeled  traffic  rattling 
along  in  its  customary  manner.  He  wished  vaguely  that 
something  might  happen  to  take  him  out  of  his  reverie. 

Something  did  happen — the  wrong  thing,  of  course.  Ma- 
dame Boisragon,  who. was  at  the  other  end  of  the  verandah, 
had  heard  the  little  commotion  he  had  made,  and  came  for- 
ward from  where  she  had  been  tending  some  flowers. 

"Did  you  speak?"  she  inquired,  scrutinizing  his  face,  yet 
remaining  where  an  imaginary  line  divided  his  half  of  the 
verandah  from  hers. 

"I  only  muttered  something,"  he  replied  with  sudden  gruff- 
ness.  "It  was  nothing  but  the  usual  irritating  letters." 

He  turned  round,  and  was  suddenly  conscious  that  she 
looked  fresh  and  attractive  in  a  white  muslin  dress,  and  that 
her  paleness  had  an  added  charm  in  the  deep  shade. 

Somehow  it  annoyed  him  very  much.  He  wished  just  then 
that  she  had  been  ugly — very  ugly. 

"Letters!"  exclaimed  Madame  Boisragon  lightly,  invading 
his  territory,  and  continuing  to  look  at  him  thoughtfully. 
"What  do  letters  matter?  If  you  could  read  my  own  cor- 
respondence!" 

She  made  a  little  grimace,  and  then  pretended  to  shudder. 

He  stood  silent  until  she  reached  his  chair,  and  then  some- 
how their  hands  met. 

"What  a  stupid  man  of  moods  you  are  to-day!"  she  teased. 
"Only  two  days  ago  you  were  complaining  of  me.  Now  I 
have  my  revenge.  Sometimes  your  letters  do  not  monopo- 
lize your  attention  so  much.  The  other  afternoon,  for  in- 
stance   See,  I  will  relieve  you  of  them." 

Before  he  had  realized  what  she  was  doing  she  had  thrust 
her  hand  into  his  coat-pocket  and  pulled  out  everything. 

"There,"  she  said,  dropping  the  contents  on  the  bamboo 
table.  "There  they  have  gone,  big  and  small  alike,  and  the 
worry  has  disappeared." 

Had  he  only  stayed  still  there  would  have  been  no  contre- 
temps. But  being  only  a  man,  he  had  not  woman's  match- 
less sang-froid.  Therefore  he  thrust  out  his  hand  to  recover 


THE  HUMAN  COBWEB  315 

his  threatened  property,  and  in  doing  so,  knocked  to  the 
ground  the  only  letter  which  had  been  opened. 

"That  is  curious,"  said  Madame  Boisragon,  picking  up  and 
scrutinizing  the  others  as  he  bent  to  the  ground,  "you  have 
not  even  opened  these;  it  is  then  only  that  one  little  letter 
which  has  caused  all  the  trouble.  Burn  it  and  then  it  will 
be  forgotten.  Here  are  the  matches." 

She  stretched  out  her  hand  to  the  box  which  was  lying  on 
the  table.  There  was  something  curiously  child-like  in  the 
suggestion;  something  which  suddenly  offended  his  English 
common  sense.  Inwardly  he  cursed  the  intimacy  which 
made  her  so  much  mistress  of  his  property;  outwardly,  in  a 
last  effort  at  saving  the  situation,  he  smiled,  and  then  did, 
of  course,  another  stupid  thing. 

"But  I  want  to  keep  the  letter,"  he  objected,  "for  I  must 
reply  to  it."  He  thought  that  sounded  well. 

But  her  quick  French  eyes  had  caught  a  glimpse  of  the 
handwriting  as  the  envelope  lay  in  his  hand,  and  at  once 
she  understood. 

"It  is  then  from  a  woman,"  she  said  slowly,  pulling  her 
hand  away  from  his.  "Oh,  yes,"  she  continued,  as  he  put 
the  letter  safely  away,  "it  is  undoubtedly  from  a  woman." 

Peter  Kerr  shrugged  his  shoulders.  He  had  no  intention  of 
denying  it. 

"Who  is  she?"  continued  the  lady,  pretending  to  smile.  An 
expression  came  on  her  face  which  Kerr  had  never  seen  be- 
fore. Nobody  understands  anything  yet  about  the  jealousy 
of  women,  though  it  has  been  written  on  for  a  goodly  num- 
ber of  centuries.  But  Kerr  felt  it — felt  its  immense 
strength — and  became  less  calm. 

"She  is  a  girl  in  England  who  has  written  me  an  ordinary 
letter,"  he  said,  "which  has  somehow  irritated  me  extraor- 
dinarily. There  you  have  the  whole  story." 

He  wished  that  his  manner  could  have  been  more  natural. 
He  saw  in  the  deepening  displeasure  on  her  face  that  he  had 
failed  to  be  convincing. 

"A  girl  in   England,"   echoed   Madame  Boisragon;   "and 


316  THE    HUMAN   COBWEB 

why  should  a  girl  in  England  have  the  power  to  produce 
such  effects?" 

She  laughed  at  her  own  question  with  that  curious  woman's 
laughter  which  rasps  a  man's  nerves  like  the  play  of  a  file  on 
iron. 

"Excuse  me,"  said  Peter  Kerr  a  little  proudly,  making  up 
his  mind  but  still  striving  to  control  himself,  "this  letter  is 
after  all  my  affair — I  mean  it  is  a  purely  personal  mat- 
ter  " 

He  did  not  say  all  he  had  to  say,  but  his  looks  supplied  the 
missing  parts. 

Madame  Boisragon  suddenly  drew  up  her  skirts  and  turned 
to  go. 

"Oh,"  she  said  in  her  cold  way  that  he  hated,  "oh,  is  that 
so?  I  shall  remember." 

Slowly  she  walked  away  with  studied  effect,  conscious  that 
his  eyes  were  on  her — conscious  that  the  man  was  observing 
every  inch  of  her. 

For  it  is  when  women  turn  their  backs  that  their  power 
ascends — that  is,  when  passions  have  not  yet  burnt  out. 


CHAPTER  XXII 

"Quand   on  n'a  pas  ce  que   1'on   aime,  il   faut 
aimer  ce  que  1'on  a."— CORNEILLE,  L'inconnu. 

IN  the  end,  of  course,  he  humbled  himself;  but  there  was 
an  open  breach  between  the  two  for  one  whole  day.  It  has 
always  been  thus,  and  so  doubtless  will  it  be  until  the  end 
of  time. 

The  Chinese,  who  will  be  properly  understood  by  the  rest 
of  the  world  in  two  or  three  hundred  years,  very  cleverly 
discovered  nearly  forty  centuries  ago  (more  or  less)  the  ex- 
istence of  what  they  call  the  dual  principle — a  principle 
which  they  maintain  runs  not  only  through  life  but  through 
every  affair.  Just  as  there  are  light  and  darkness,  so  must 
there  be  always  an  active  and  a  passive  force,  say  these  origi- 
nal thinkers.  This  is  known  to  them  as  the  principle  of  Yin 
and  Yang,  a  mighty  principle  which  is  the  beginning  and 
end — the  reason,  the  explanation,  the  justification,  the  I- 
know-not-what — of  all  things  in  this  delightful  world.  The 
two  forces,  endlessly  acting  and  reacting  on  each  other,  by 
such  ceaseless  reciprocity  make  all  things  possible.  Arguing 
on  these  lines,  the  female  force,  being  the  passive  one,  has 
therefore  only  to  wait  long  enough  for  the  active  force  to 
assert  itself  in  the  way  it  inevitably  must. 

It  is  all  very  curious.  Doubtless  when  the  Chinese  be- 
come scientific  in  a  strictly  modern  way,  arguing  from  these 
principles  they  will  be  able  to  codify  a  whole  series  of  inter- 
esting deductions  regarding  the  sexes,  which  although  now 
generally  surmised  have  not  yet  received  proper  scholarly 
recognition. 

In  passing  it  may  also  be  observed  that  the  inventors  of 
China's  peculiar  ideographic  and  pictorial  writing — these 
people  of  forty  centuries  ago — have  preserved  for  all  time 


3i8  THE   HUMAN  COBWEB 

in  their  language  their  cynical  analysis  of  the  passive  or 
female  element — the  manner  in  which,  if  left  alone,  it 
makes  for  evil  rather  than  good — by  making  the  sign 
(known  as  a  radical  character)  for  woman,  which  is  pic- 
torially  represented,  find  a  place  in  many  compound  charac- 
ters in  which  a  bad  quality  is  represented.  They  begin  in  a 
fit  way  by  ingeniously  representing  peace  as  nothing  else 
than  a  woman  underneath  a  roof  (that  is,  a  woman  shut  up 
indoors).  They  pass  on  to  denote  envy  or  malice  as  a 
woman  peeping  at  a  door.  To  be  covetous  is  represented  by 
a  woman  in  a  forest;  a  phantom  is  compounded  by  writing 
"woman"  and  "fair"  together.  To  be  proud  is  denoted  by 
"woman"  and  "dry"  written  side  by  side;  and  so  on  to  the 
end  of  the  chapter  in  many  dozens  of  ingenious  combina- 
tions. They  crown  this  unfeeling  shame  by  making  a  group 
of  three  women — that  is,  the  character  woman  written  three 
times  over — apply  loosely  to  unchastity  generally.  How 
worthy  of  censure  are  these  old-world  cynics! 

Perhaps  it  was  necessary,  being  in  the  land  of  this  analytical 
people,  that  the  universal  law  should  be  obeyed.  And  so  it 
came  about  that  in  this  particular  case  of  which  we  write  the 
man  was  actively  repentant  and  the  woman  passively  con- 
tented. 

Something  had  been  lost,  however,  something  which  would 
never  return;  and  Lorenzo,  finding  Peter  Kerr  taking  an 
increasing  interest  in  going  out  with  him  and  interviewing 
various  influential  officials,  began  to  believe  that  his  tactics 
were  already  successful.  Kerr  had  in  any  case  totally  lost 
his  original  aversion  to  canvassing  far  and  wide  in  the  ir- 
regular way  which  suited  the  East;  and  he  showed  that  he 
proposed  to  avail  himself  of  all  possible  allies.  The  Manchu 
Prince  to  whom  they  had  confided  the  special  patronage  of 
the  enterprise  referred  them  endlessly  to  others,  through 
secretaries  and  interpreters  who  came  and  went  mysteriously 
in  blue-hooded  Peking  carts.  All  these  men  seemed  very 
anxious  that  no  one  should  steal  a  march  on  them.  If  they 


THE  HUMAN  COBWEB  319 

collided  in  the  corridors  of  the  little  hotel  with  other  emis- 
saries, they  had  no  hesitation  in  showing  their  distrust  and 
hinting  about  the  dangers  of  traitors.  There  was  a  uni- 
versal desire  among  this  lesser  fry  to  appropriate  all  the 
pickings  that  were  to  be  had,  and  the  easiest  way  of  accom- 
plishing this  was  to  attack  competitors — that  is,  those  who 
protested  they  could  be  of  use,  too.  It  was  infinitely  tan- 
talizing though  not  very  expensive  work;  for  almost  each 
day  found  a  fresh  batch  of  men  to  be  dealt  with. 

One  afternoon,  when  Kerr  was  tired  with  all  this  curious 
work  and  too  lazy  to  ride,  he  went  up  on  the  Tartar  Wall, 
and  strode  away  to  where  the  great  rampart  looks  down  on 
a  picturesque  tracing  of  canals  and  distant  temple-grounds 
full  of  sombre  green  trees — a  scene  which  in  the  golden 
light  of  the  setting  sun  cannot  be  anywhere  surpassed  in  the 
summer  days.  The  challenge  of  rival  colours,  the  vast  dis- 
tances, the  miraculous  clearness  of  the  atmosphere,  combined 
to  make  a  matchless  panorama  under  the  dome  of  spotless 
blue  and  somewhat  eased  his  heart. 

Slowly  walking  along,  he  came  at  length  to  an  out  jutting 
buttress;  and  there,  to  his  surprise,  he  found  standing,  quite 
motionless,  little  Mrs.  Hopeful.  She  was  drinking  it  all  in 
with  a  strange  expression  of  rapture  illuminating  her  face. 

"Is  it  not  wonderful?"  she  whispered  at  length,  pointing  to 
where  the  canal,  flowing  immediately  under  the  Tartar 
Wall,  mysteriously  entered  a  landscape  full  of  green  and 
yellow  tiled  roofs  set  amidst  the  stately  groves  of  trees.  "If 
one  could  only  fix  it  for  all  time  in  verse."  A  note-book  in 
her  hand  showed  him  what  her  occupation  had  been. 

"I  have  got  something  very  near  it,"  she  murmured,  more 
to  herself  than  any  one  else.  "Perhaps  it  will  do.  If  I 
could  only  be  sure!" 

She  sighed  and  hid  the  note-book  suddenly  in  her  pocket. 

"Well,  what  are  you  doing  here  alone,  Mr.  Kerr?"  she 
suddenly  recommenced  in  a  matter-of-fact  voice,  as  if  she 
had  only  just  noticed  him.  "Where  are  all  your  compan- 
ions?" 


320  THE   HITMAN   COBWEB 

He  pointed  with  his  stick  in  the  direction  of  the  Inner  city 
behind  them. 

"Down  there,  I  should  imagine,  playing  tennis,  or  calling, 
or  gossiping  endlessly,  or  doing  some  other  obvious  things." 

She  looked  at  him,  surprised  at  his  tone  of  voice,  which  was 
almost  bitter. 

"Why  should  tennis  or  calling  or  gossiping  be  so  obvious?" 
she  inquired  thoughtfully.  "You  imply  thereby  that  there 
can  be  things  which  are  not  so  easily  defined." 

Kerr  allowed  his  features  to  relax  a  little;  an  argument 
always  interested  him  and  banished  his  uncomfortable 
thoughts. 

"If  I  shout  or  jump  about  in  broad  daylight  I  am  doing 
something  that  is  quite  obvious,"  he  said.  "If,  on  the  other 
hand,  I  stand  on  my  head  in  the  middle  of  the  night,  it  is 
not  obvious — at  least,  relatively  speaking." 

Mrs.  Hopeful  looked  at  him,  not  certain  whether  he  was 
serious  or  not. 

"I  believe  you  are  talking  absurdities,"  she  replied.  "Do 
you  ever  stand  on  your  head  in  the  middle  of  the  night?  If 
you  had  said  you  were  walking  alone  on  the  Wall  because 
the  spirit  moved  you  to  do  so,  I  might  have  confessed  that 
that  is  exactly  the  reason  why  I  am  here.  As  it  is,  I  feel 
strongly  tempted  to  argue  with  you  on  the  proper  definition 
of  a  word." 

"Why  do  you  feel  like  being  alone  on  the  Wall?"  asked 
Peter  Kerr  bluntly,  avoiding  further  discussion. 

"Shall  I  be  frank?"  she  inquired.  "Well,  in  any  case,  I 
am  going  to  tell  you.  It  was  very  simple.  Jack  was  boring 
me  to  extinction." 

"Really!"  said  Peter  Kerr,  beginning  to  smile,  and  realiz- 
ing that  it  is  better  to  be  humorous  than  gloomy.  "How  un- 
original of  Jack!" 

"It  was  indeed,"  sighed  the  little  woman,  staring  into 
space. 

"You  know,"  she  continued,  "we  have  a  wonderful  scheme, 
too — that  is,  Jack  has — and  my  husband,  who  is  down  some- 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  321 

where  in  the  middle  of  China,  is  looking  after  the  other  end 
of  it.  Every  now  and  again  Jack  gets  a  horrid  fit  of  energy 
and  says  that  business  must  come  before  pleasure.  Isn't  it 
stupid  ?  This  means  that  he  sits  moodily  trying  to  work  out 
calculations  and  getting  irritated  with  other  people's  cor- 
respondence. Can  you  wonder  that  I  am  bored?" 

"You  are  a  martyr,"  said  Kerr,  somewhat  solemnly. 

She  agreed  with  a  pensive  shake  of  her  curly  head. 

"You  are  rails,  aren't  you?"  she  inquired  without  curiosity, 
looking  at  him  doubtfully.  "I  mean  railway  concessions." 

"Yes,"  confessed  Peter  Kerr,  suddenly  speaking  in  another 
tone  and  wondering  how  much  she  knew  of  his  affairs.  "I 
suppose  I  am." 

Mrs.  Hopeful  hardly  waited  for  his  answer;  she  was  full 
of  her  own  ideas. 

"We  are  water-power  and  improvement  of  rivers,"  she 
said.  "Straightening  them  out,  you  know.  It  is  an  ideal 
business  apparently.  There  is  one  river  which  Jack  says 
might  make  his  fortune,  if  he  could  get  hold  of  it.  But  that 
is  just  the  trouble.  People  are  so  slow  at  appreciating  novel 
ideas.  The  other  evening,  at  one  of  the  Legations,  every- 
body began  talking  concessions,  and  one  man  was  chaffing 
Jack  badly.  Jack  finally  got  wild  and  asked  him  whether 
he  did  not  believe  it  was  possible  to  straighten  out  this  par- 
ticular river. 

'  'Yes,'  said  the  other,  'certainly;  I  have  the  secret  of  the 
only  method.' 

'  'How?'  inquired  Jack,  becoming  all  ears. 

'  'Why,'  said  the  other  man,  'the  only  way  to  straighten  it 
is  to  get  hold  of  the  tail  and  put  a  few  million  Chinese  on 
the  job  and  let  them  pull  with  a  long  jolly  pull !  And  then, 
by  Jove,  it  will  come  straight,  but  not  before !' 

"The  man  was  a  naval  officer  who  had  been  on  that 
wretched  river  for  three  years,  so  he  knew  what  he  was 
talking  about.  Jack  has  not  recovered  from  that  yet.  I  be- 
lieve whenever  he  begins  to  work  he  thinks  of  it,  and  of 
course  gets  angry.  Once  upon  a  time  I  replied  to  an  Amer- 


322  THE  HUMAN  COBWEB 

ican  advertisement  calling  attention  to  the  perfect  method 
of  exterminating  fleas.  For  my  two  dollars  I  got  back  a  lit- 
tle box  containing  two  wooden  blocks,  marked  'A'  and  'B.' 
The  instructions  curtly  said  that  having  secured  the  flea,  the 
only  thing  necessary  was  to  place  him  on  block  'A'  and  strike 
him  smartly  with  block  'B.'  There  is  nothing  like  learn- 
ing!" 

Peter  Kerr  laughed  at  the  little  woman,  but  very  soon  be- 
came serious  again. 

"Perhaps  all  of  our  schemes  are  moonshine,"  he  said 
thoughtfully,  taking  out  his  cigarette-case ;  "we  are  all  work- 
ing in  the  dark  in  a  rather  most  audacious  manner." 

Mrs.  Hopeful  lighted  her  cigarette  before  she  spoke.  The 
smoke  seemed  to  give  her  inspiration. 

"Shall  I  shut  my  eyes  and  tell  you  what  I  see?"  she  asked. 
"I  can  see  things  sometimes  very  well.  It  may  help." 

Peter  Kerr  nodded.  She  was  so  full  of  mysticism  and  mag- 
netism that  she  impelled  an  unwilling  respect.  Without  a 
word  she  now  leaned  her  forehead  against  the  grey  brick 
parapet  and  clasped  her  hands  in  an  attitude  almost  of 
prayer.  Kerr  watched  her  curiously  and  took  care  not  to 
move.  % 

"I  see,"  she  said  at  length,  "Lorenzo  successful — completely 
successful.  I  am  quite  sure  of  it.  I  see  another  man  suc- 
cessful, too — oh,  yes,  he  is  successful.  He  is  tall  and  dark, 
and  has  a  great  black  beard  covering  his  whole  face,  and  he 
walks  in  a  quick  yet  shambling  way.  I  do  not  know  in  the 
least  who  this  man  is:  I  have  never  seen  him.  I  see  a  third 
man  who  is  also  successful — yes,  I  think  he  is  successful — a 

man  who,  who "  She  broke  off  and  muttered  to  herself 

in  a  quick  undertone.  Then  suddenly,  without  warning, 
she  pulled  her  head  away  from  the  brickwork  and  opened 
her  eyes. 

"Bother,"  she  said  in  her  natural  voice,  looking  at  Kerr  re- 
flectively, "I  thought  I  had  something  else  as  well,  but  it  es- 
caped me.  It  slipped  away  quickly  somewhere  up  into  the 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  323 

clouds,  and  though  I  tried  to  follow,  I  lost  it.  I  wonder 
who  it  was.  It  crossed  and  followed  the  third  man.  How- 
ever, I  have  got  the  third  man  all  right.  I  am  very  sorry, 
but  this  man  is  neither  you  nor  Jack.  Oh,  no!  Do  you 
know  who  he  is?  He  is  that  odious  little  creature  Bois- 
ragon." 

The  colour  stole  slowly  into  Kerr's  cheeks,  as  a  mixture  of 
irritation  and  apprehension  filled  him.  He  would  have  liked 
to  laugh,  but  something  prevented  him.  Was  this  really  to 
be  the  end? 

Mrs.  Hopeful  looked  at  him  almost  wistfully,  as  he  stood 
there  leaning  on  his  stick.  There  was  something  pathetic 
about  her  little  figure.  It  was  as  if  she  possessed  a  spirit  too 
large  for  her  small  frame — a  spirit  which  would  one  day 
burst  its  cage. 

"You  seem  to  have  a  wonderful  power,"  said  Kerr  at 
length.  "For  instance,  the  other  evening  with  Mr.  Smith." 

"Don't,"  interrupted  Mrs.  Hopeful,  the  colour  now  leap- 
ing into  her  cheeks  and  her  eyes  sparkling.  "Jack  is  furious 
about  that!  Still  he  says  I  disgraced  him.  /  say  that  no- 
body even  noticed  it.  But  I  can  do  it  easily,  can  I  not?  I 
believe  I  could  make  him  cut  off  his  finger  or  swallow  a  bot- 
tle of  vinegar.  Oh,  yes!" 

Her  eyes  roamed  over  the  vast  landscape  spread  below  them. 

"It  needs  all  sorts  of  people  to  make  a  world — does  it 
not?"  she  continued  pensively.  "All  sorts  of  people.  There 
must  be  people  who  dance  and  people  who  sing;  people  who 
weep  and  people  who  laugh ;  fat  people  and  thin  people ;  tall 
people  and  short  people;  dark  people  and  fair  people;  peo- 
ple who  love  and  people  who  haven't  got  it  in  them  to  love 
at  all." 

She  turned  and  regarded  him  in  a  sly  way.  Unfortunately 
for  him  he  was  looking  out  reflectively  over  the  parapet.  He 
seemed  to  invite  a  flank  attack.  Mrs.  Hopeful  could  not  re- 
sist it. 

"Mr.  Kerr,"  she  said  suddenly,  "I  should  love  to  see  you 


324  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

two  alone.  You  are  both  so  different  from  me — so  re- 
pressed, so  careful,  so  cold,  so  distant.  Oh,  it  is  curious! 
Mr.  Kerr,  do  tell  me  how  you  make  love!" 

Instead  of  laughing  she  laid  an  imploring  hand  on  his 
sleeve.  He  turned  with  a  start  and  shot  a  glance  at  her. 
She  was  so  small  and  volatile  and  had  such  big,  innocent 
eyes  that  it  was  in  vain  that  he  tried  to  be  openly  angry. 

"Why,"  he  said  at  length,  changing  colour,  "why,  Mrs. 
Hopeful " 

He  stopped  without  concluding.  She  dropped  her  eyes  in 
open  disappointment. 

"Of  course,"  she  went  on,  "I  am  only  being  absurd:  you 
must  not  mind  me — do  not  be  angry.  I  would  dearly  like  to 
know,  and  now  I  shall  never  know." 

She  resumed  her  study  of  the  landscape,  with  a  sigh  which 
still  further  disarmed  him.  It  was  hard  for  him  to  talk 
much  more;  so  soon,  begging  her  permission  to  do  so,  he 
continued  his  walk  alone. 

When  he  came  down  at  length  off  the  mighty  Wall,  he 
was  astonished  to  find  that  little  encampments  of  square  blue 
tents  had  sprung  up  like  mushrooms  under  the  Gates. 
Groups  of  picturesque  but  savage-looking  soldiers  were 
standing  or  lounging  about  near  them,  with  their  rifles 
stacked  in  neat  little  piles  between  the  tents.  Above  flaunted 
parti-coloured  banners,  lending  to  the  scene  an  additional 
air  of  romance ;  and  lines  of  ponies  tethered  to  stakes  showed 
that  many  of  the  men  were  mounted.  Under  the  shadow 
of  the  grim  Tartar  Wall,  at  times  half  obscured  by  the 
clouds  of  grey  dust  flung  up  by  the  ceaseless  cart  traffic,  these 
soldiers  seemed  to  sound  a  peculiar  note  of  warning. 

Kerr  leaned  on  his  stick  and  watched  them  for  many  min- 
utes, welcoming  the  change  it  gave  to  his  thoughts.  When 
he  walked  away  he  noticed  that  a  fist  was  shaken,  and  that 
several  men  spat  on  the  ground. 

He  wondered  what  it  meant. 


CHAPTER  XXIII 

"Tous  les  evenements  sont  enchaines  dans  le 
meilleur  des  mondes  possibles." — VOLTAIRE,  Can- 
dide. 

THE  month  of  August  was  drawing  to  a  close  and  the  fierce 
summer  heat  gradually  abating.  It  is  doubtless  one  of  Na- 
ture's wise  provisions  that,  in  all  those  vast  regions  of  the 
world  where  the  winters  are  so  long  and  so  cruel,  there 
should  be  no  real  spring  but  only  summer.  From  ice  and 
snow  there  comes  a  sudden  and  almost  magical  transition  to 
heat  which  even  when  the  nights  are  still  cold  is  at  mid- 
day quite  tropical.  All  through  May  the  sun  is  putting  forth 
his  very  mightiest  efforts  to  consume  the  cold  which  has  so 
long  imprisoned  the  soil,  and  thus  to  quicken  to  luxuriant  life 
the  struggling  crops.  This  month  is  in  northern  climes 
almost  the  hottest  of  the  year ;  for  later,  though  the  heat  still 
lasts  and  the  climate  of  necessity  becomes  more  unhealthful, 
the  burden  of  living  is  much  relieved  by  the  constant  rains. 

For  no  sooner  has  Nature  been  stimulated  to  do  her  best  by 
this  imperative  action  of  the  sun,  than  the  soil  has  become 
so  parched  that  to  quench  such  unnatural  thirst  the  rain- 
clouds  slowly  accumulate,  and  soon  empty  themselves  of 
their  moisture  in  torrential  and  soul-deadening  downpours. 
That  is  the  second  summer  phase.  Towards  the  close  of 
August,  in  the  northern  provinces  of  China,  the  shortening 
days  allow  cool  evening  breezes  to  fan  the  air  and  render 
life  almost  enjoyable  at  a  time  when  the  rest  of  the  great 
empire  is  still  gasping  for  breath  both  night  and  day.  The 
worst  is  over  in  the  sun-dried  north.  The  battle  has  made 
up  for  what  it  has  lacked  in  length  by  the  vehemence  with 
which  the  first  onslaughts  were  delivered.  Thus  does  the 
wonderful  law  of  compensations  always  operate  for  the  ben- 
efit of  man. 


326  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

This  oppression  of  summer  is  generally  not  felt  so  much 
by  those  whose  blood  has  not  been  thinned  by  long  residence 
in  such  climates.  And  thus  it  happened  that  though  the 
occupants  of  the  little  hotel,  immersed  in  their  various  con- 
cerns, complained  from  time  to  time  of  the  heat,  it  was  not 
until  the  cooler  evenings  and  the  pleasant  breezes  eloquently 
informed  them  of  the  furnace  they  had  been  through,  that 
they  all  wondered  aloud  how  they  had  been  able  to  stand 
what  hardened  residents  proclaimed  a  doleful  and  distressing 
time. 

Somebody  proposed  in  the  midst  of  these  reflections  that 
they  should  at  least  have  a  short  holiday  by  riding  to  the 
Great  Wall  of  China.  Both  Madame  Boisragon  and  Mrs. 
Hopeful,  each  for  a  different  reason,  jumped  at  the  idea — 
they  would  be  delighted  to  have  a  brief  change,  they  said. 
It  wanted  but  three  days  to  the  fifteenth  of  the  Chinese 
lunar  month;  so  if  they  completed  their  preparations  speed- 
ily, they  would  arrive  at  the  top  of  the  mountains  on  the 
night  of  the  fifteenth  day  and  see  the  wonderful  edifice  by 
the  light  of  the  full  moon.  Could  it  be  arranged  in  time  ? 

Fortunately  there  was  Carnot.  Carnot  undertook  to  have 
everything  arranged  at  once.  Money  being  the  golden  key 
which  unlocks  all  gates,  it  was  merely  a  question  of  dollars 
to  secure  that  a  caravan  of  carts,  duly  supplied  with  all  pos- 
sible luxuries,  should  stand  waiting  on  the  dusty  street  out- 
side the  hotel  for  the  start  to  be  made.  Carnot,  like  an  old 
campaigner,  always  had  everything  in  order  in  a  few  hours. 

Of  the  little  party  at  the  hotel,  only  Lorenzo  refused  to  go. 
He  had  no  time  for  holidays,  he  said.  He  attempted  to  per- 
suade Kerr  that  it  was  a  bad  moment  to  be  absent  even  for 
a  couple  of  days;  but  Kerr  was  resolute  and  said  that  he  too 
needed  a  change.  Besides,  nothing  very  much  could  happen 
in  seventy-two  hours,  which  was  the  maximum  time  he  pro- 
posed to  be  absent.  So  Lorenzo,  who  had  been  satisfied  with 
his  attention  to  business  ever  since  the  day  he  had  talked  to 
him  so  frankly,  merely  shrugged  his  shoulders  and  dropped 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  327 

the  subject.  Tall  Mr.  Smith,  and  two  or  three  other  men, 
who  said  they  should  really  not  be  absent  for  more  than  a 
few  hours  in  those  busy  times,  were  also  only  too  glad  of  an 
excuse  to  get  away  from  the  wall-bound  city;  and  so  it  came 
about  that  they  all  managed  to  make  up  their  minds  late  the 
same  afternoon  the  proposal  had  been  made. 

By  seven  o'clock  the  next  morning  (though  they  should 
have  started  at  five)  they  were  actually  off,  the  mob  of 
ponies  raising  clouds  of  dust  as  they  went  down  the  street. 
They  passed  like  some  band  of  irregular  cavalry  (for  to 
every  person  was  attached  the  inevitable  mafu)  down  mile 
after  mile  of  the  endless  raised  driving-roads  within  the 
limits  of  the  Tartar  city,  for  in  imperial  Peking  there  is  am- 
ple room  for  an  army  of  a  million  or  two.  Everybody  was 
in  a  gay  mood  and  anxious  to  push  on.  So  they  cantered, 
they  trotted,  they  galloped,  covering  the  ground  very  quickly 
and  leaving  behind  them  great  wreaths  and  clouds  of  dust, 
which  twisted  and  turned  and  finally  dissolved  themselves 
against  the  faces  of  indignant  shopkeepers  just  beginning  to 
wake  up  and  stand  in  groups  at  their  doors,  drowsily  dis- 
cussing market  affairs. 

They  were  beginning  to  catch  sight  of  the  flanking  city 
walls,  when  to  their  astonishment  a  rapid  clanging  of  gongs 
and  a  growing  rush  of  blue-clad  people  arrested  their  prog- 
ress. Smoke  had  begun  to  rise  in  dense  columns  from  some 
big  buildings  standing  inside  high  compound  walls,  a  few 
hundred  yards  away  from  where  they  were  riding;  and  now, 
as  if  by  magic,  the  general  aspect  of  the  street  changed. 
Some  strange  word  must  have  flown  along;  for  of  one  ac- 
cord, the  masters  of  shops  which  had  just  been  opened  be- 
gan rapidly  putting  up  their  solid  wooden  shutters  once  more, 
leaving  only  a  narrow  space  open,  out  of  which  anxious  faces 
peered. 

"Shall  we  stop  and  see  it?"  asked  Peter  Kerr,  trying  to 
quiet  his  fuming  pony.  They  had  ridden  nearly  five  miles 
without  a  pause  and  the  ladies  might  need  a  rest,  he  thought, 


328  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

A  young  attache,  who  was  one  of  their  party  and  was  talk- 
ing volubly  to  his  mafu  in  the  vernacular,  suddenly  made  a 
gesture  of  dissent. 

"It  is  unwise,  I  think,"  he  said,  and  some  of  the  others 
promptly  seconded  him. 

"No,  no,  let  us  stop.  Let  us  stop,"  cried  Mrs.  Hopeful, 
impulsively  overruling  every  one.  The  attache  now  ex- 
plained that  his  man  had  said  it  would  be  foolish  to  remain 
where  they  were,  as  the  shops  only  closed  in  the  peculiar 
manner  they  were  now  doing  when  it  was  secretly  known 
that  the  city  was  disturbed.  Kerr  remembered  then  the 
stone  that  had  been  thrown  at  Lorenzo  and  had  cut  his  face 
so  many  weeks  ago;  he  remembered  also  the  insolent  man 
he  had  thrown  down  inside  the  Imperial  city;  and  finally 
he  remembered  the  little  encampments  of  soldiery  he  had  ob- 
served quite  recently  under  the  City  Gates.  Instantly  he  was 
sorry  that  he  had  not  insisted  on  their  riding  on.  The  women 
might  be  in  danger.  The  other  men,  however,  seemed  sud- 
denly to  become  rather  indifferent;  they  knew  nothing  of 
any  menace,  and  in  their  present  festive  mood  they  would 
have  perhaps  laughed  at  his  warnings.  So  the  party  began 
riding  slowly  down  the  street  again,  without  any  one  know- 
ing what  they  proposed  to  do. 

The  young  attache  soon  came  alongside  Peter  Kerr. 

"If  they  only  knew  all  I  knew,"  he  grumbled,  "they  would 
not  be  so  devilish  keen  to  get  mixed  up  in  a  Peking  crowd." 

Kerr  looked  at  him  inquiringly. 

"Is  there  really  anything  in  the  stories  floating  around?" 

The  young  man  laughed  and  made  an  irritated  gesture, 
spurring  his  pony,  which  was  shying  at  the  running  people, 
at  the  same  time. 

"I  don't  know,"  he  answered  gloomily;  "one  day  the  chief 
wires  home  all  sorts  of  things — the  next  day  he  contradicts 
them.  Who  can  ever  know  in  this  country?" 

Kerr  suddenly  quickened  his  pony  into  a  hand-gallop  and 
caught  up  with  the  leaders.  He  had  made  up  his  mind. 

"Let  us  in  any  case  get  off  the  main  road,"  he  called  to 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  329 

Madame  Boisragon,  who  was  watching  with  wondering 
eyes  the  streams  of  people  now  pouring  towards  the  burning 
building.  He  led  the  way  down  the  steep  embankment  to 
the  entrance  of  a  broad  lane,  where  at  least  it  would  be 
safer.  Fortunately  everybody  followed  him. 

"Why  did  we  come  down  here?"  said  Mrs.  Hopeful  petu- 
lantly, as  soon  as  they  had  drawn  rein  and  were  trying  to 
prevent  their  excited  ponies  from  bumping  and  kicking  one 
another.  "We  can't  see  half  as  well."  She  flashed  her 
eyes  in  anger  at  Kerr. 

There  was,  however,  now  no  need  for  any  answer.  The 
crowds  had  grown  so  magically,  as  they  had  ridden  the 
last  few  yards,  that  even  where  they  were  now  halted  they 
were  soon  quite  surrounded,  whilst  on  the  main  road  the 
confusion  became  worse  confounded.  Every  house,  every 
side-street,  every  lane,  as  if  some  secret  watchword  had 
been  passed,  had  sent  its  dozens  and  hundreds  of  people  to 
gaze  and  gabble;  and  every  time-beat  seemed  to  add  per- 
ceptibly to  the  throng.  There  was  nothing  to  be  heard  but 
a  great  din  of  gongs  beaten  with  frantic  vigour. 

"That's  funny,"  exclaimed  the  attache  suddenly. 

"What's  funny?"  echoed  every  one. 

"Why,"  he  replied,  pointing  with  his  hunting-crop,  "there 
is  one  fire-brigade  coming  already.  It's  not  ten  minutes  since 
the  first  smoke  was  seen.  Generally  it  takes  at  least  an  hour 
to  wake  them  up."  He  continued  to  mutter  exclamations 
to  himself  which  remained  quite  unheeded.  Every  one  was 
engaged  in  watching  this  new  development. 

Dozens  of  little  white  flags  covered  with  black  characters 
now  tossed  above  the  seething  blue-clad  throng  which  already 
completely  blocked  the  raised  driving-road.  Men  on  the 
edge  of  this  highroad,  forced  back  farther  and  farther  by 
the  violent  pressure,  began  tumbling  down  the  embankment 
just  as  pebbles  roll  down  a  beach.  They  raised  puffs  of 
dust  as  they  fell,  as  if  they  were  human  projectiles  discharged 
and  flung  on  the  ground  by  the  explosion  of  passions.  The 
din  made  by  the  gongs  became  so  uproarious  that  everjj 


330  THE    HUMAN   COBWEB 

other  sound — the  shouts,  the  cries,  the  hum  of  the  mob — was 
completely  drowned,  crushed,  and  irresistibly  beaten  down 
by  the  ceaseless  roar  of  bronze  and  iron. 

"Do  you  understand  why  we  came  down  here?"  shouted 
Peter  Kerr  into  Mrs.  Hopeful's  ears.  She  nodded  anxiously 
and  did  not  speak.  She  was  beginning  to  understand  what 
an  Eastern  crowd  can  be.  It  was  a  realization  of  Milton's 
Pandemonium. 

On  the  highroad,  in  spite  of  the  great  press  of  people,  the 
gongmen  and  flagmen  managed  somehow  to  force  their  way 
ruthlessly  forward;  and  behind  them,  for  an  instant,  the 
anxious  little  riding-party,  halted  at  the  mouth  of  the  lane, 
had  a  glimpse  of  a  great  mediaeval-looking  brass-bound  pump 
carried  by  a  horde  of  staggering,  sweating  men.  The  weight 
must  have  been  immense,  for  the  bearers  cried  a  storm  of 
frantic  protests  at  being  forced  along  so  rapidly.  They  were 
like  a  great  pack  of  dogs,  tearing,  wrenching,  pulling, 
fighting  with  something  which  dragged  them  relentlessly 
along.  At  last  one  man,  in  clear  view  of  the  little  party, 
suddenly  removed  his  shoulders  from  the  burden  with  a 
violent  cry  and  a  wave  of  his  arms.  He  was  utterly 
exhausted.  Instantly  some  of  the  officers,  hurrying  at  a 
jog-trot  beside  the  great  pump,  felled  him  to  the  ground 
with  the  iron  hooks  they  were  carrying;  and  throwing  up 
his  arms,  the  wretched  man  rolled  down  the  embankment 
as  if  he  had  been  poleaxed.  In  the  eyes  of  the  little  party  it 
became  a  sort  of  Juggernaut's  car;  woe  to  him  who  released 
his  hold. 

"Oh,  how  brutal!"  cried  Mrs.  Hopeful,  shutting  her  eyes 
and  shuddering  as  she  understood  the  scene.  The  men  of 
the  party  became  more  and  more  nervous.  They  were  now 
completely  shut  in:  they  were  wedged  together  as  in  a 
vise  by  the  sweating  masses  of  humanity  around  them.  Add- 
ing to  the  danger  of  being  thrown  and  crushed,  were  num- 
bers of  long  country  carts  which  had  been  obliged  to  escape 
from  the  main  road,  and  whose  drivers,  were  now  trying  to 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  331 

force  their  way  into  the  lane  behind,  in  a  paroxysm  of  fear 
and  amidst  a  storm  of  shouts. 

"Damn  you!"  cried  Peter  Kerr  angrily,  as  a  carter  standing 
upright  on  his  shafts  drove  his  team  right  into  their  ponies 
in  his  effort  to  enter  the  lane  and  force  a  passage.  The 
mules,  thrown  on  their  haunches  as  they  collided,  kicked  and 
squealed  in  discordant  tones.  Kerr  swung  the  lash  of  his 
hunting-crop  clear  and  without  compunction  began  furiously 
lashing  at  the  man,  who  fell  back  on  his  cart.  Then,  without 
stopping,  Kerr  turned  his  attention  to  the  team  and  beat  the 
luckless  animals  savagely  back.  The  others  of  the  party, 
surprised  at  his  sudden  anger,  merely  looked  on ;  whilst  very 
soon  the  carter,  at  first  merely  panic-stricken,  began  to  call 
oaths  and  make  furious  gestures.  Kerr,  roused  more  and 
more,  though  he  did  not  understand  what  was  being  said  to 
him,  was  about  to  resume  his  onslaught,  when  the  young 
attache  interposed. 

"Be  careful,  be  careful,"  he  said  nervously.  "You  can  take 
care  of  yourself,  but  remember  the  ladies.  This  is  the  devil 
of  a  mess." 

He  placed  himself  so  that  Kerr  could  strike  no  more  without 
hitting  him. 

But  the  carter  was  becoming  more  and  more  excited.  Hav- 
ing an  appreciative  audience,  he  was  now  goading  himself 
on  by  the  sound  of  his  voice  and  daring  this  outlander  to 
come  near  him  again.  He  bared  his  sinewy  brown  chest  and 
shook  his  long  whip.  In  a  few  minutes  he  might  have 
backed  up  his  words  with  blows  and  started  an  ugly  brawl 
had  not  a  new  sensation  among  the  crowd  whirled  him 
into  oblivion  as  a  straw  is  engulfed  by  a  wave. 

All  down  the  street  the  people  now  began  to  tumble  back 
with  excited  cries,  putting  their  arms  above  their  heads  and 
calling,  "Ping  lai-la,  ping  lai-la."  The  cry  was  swiftly 
taken  up  and  repeated  ineaninglessly  by  a  myriad  voices,  until 
it  seemed  to  race  like  a  prairie  fire  into  the  distance,  leaving 
havoc  behind  it.  Those  who  could  not  understand  what  was 


332  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

happening  were  routed  by  the  tremendous  pressure  of  those 
who  did  understand.  The  little  party  began  to  fare  badly, 
for  their  ponies  became  more  and  more  unmanageable. 

"Keep  your  seat  and  hold  your  pony  up  whatever  happens," 
shouted  Peter  Kerr  into  Madame  Boisragon's  ears,  trying 
to  save  her  legs  from  being  crushed.  "Hold  him  up,  hold 
him  up,"  he  repeated  furiously. 

Once  again  he  used  his  crop  unmercifully  all  round  him, 
spurring  his  pony  tremendously  and  hurling  him  this  way 
and  that.  Somehow  the  crowd  managed  to  find  outlets 
invisible  to  the  eye,  and  the  pressure,  which  had  become 
unbearable,  slowly  relaxed.  Then  on  the  high  driving-road 
the  reason  of  the  sauve-qui-peut  was 'made  clear. 

Soldiers  were  coming — many  soldiers,  evidently. 

Slashing  about  them  with  their  short  riding-whips  and 
riding  recklessly  was  a  confused  mass  of  savage-looking 
cavalry,  who  from  their  looks  might  have  been  Genghis 
Khan's  horsemen  revived  from  the  dead.  Their  black  tur- 
bans folded  low  down  and  half  masking  their  bronzed  faces; 
their  loose  tunics  of  crimson  cloth,  edged  with  black  velvet; 
their  "tiger-skirts"  of  the  same  brilliant  colouring  which  they 
wore  over  their  legs — all  these  things  were  strangely  bar- 
baric and  strangely  threatening.  Each  man  had  a  carbine 
slung  on  his  back  and  a  heavy  curved  sword  at  his  side, 
whilst  some  had  bandoliers  of  cartridges,  and  others  none. 
Mixed  together  and  yet  preserving  instinctively  the  curious 
formation  of  irregular  cavalry — the  cavalry  which  lumps 
its  horses  as  closely  as  possible  in  knots  of  dissimilar  size — 
they  presented  a  remarkable  spectacle. 

The  first  band  passed  so  rapidly  that  they  were  gone  before 
there  was  time  to  do  more  than  barely  notice  these  details. 
The  confused  blue  wreckage  they  left  behind  on  the  grey 
highway — men  thrown  on  the  ground,  men  standing  stupidly 
dazed  from  the  blows  they  had  received,  men  still  crouching 
on  the  steep  embankment  in  attitudes  of  supplication — this 
blue  wreckage  was  slowly  coming  to  life  again,  when  a 
fresh  movement  of  fear  was  communicated  to  all.  As  a 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  333 

current  of  electricity  passes,  so  did  the  knowledge  speed  to 
the  mobs  that  this  irregular  mass  was  only  a  vanguard.  At 
once  the  scramble  began  anew;  and  this  time  the  highway 
was  as  completely  cleared  as  if  a  whirlwind  had  passed  over 
it.  Even  those  who  had  been  trampled  under  foot  somehow 
managed  to  get  away.  Now  the  high  roadway,  as  far  as  the 
eye  could  see,  was  entirely  abandoned  to  this  savage  soldiery. 

To  the  little  party  at  the  mouth  of  the  lane  it  was  just  as  if 
a  blue  patchwork  curtain  had  now  been  completely  drawn 
aside.  The  high  roadway  became  a  stage — so  brilliantly 
lighted  by  the  golden  sunlight  that  every  detail  was  clear. 

They  now  saw  advancing  a  dense  mass  of  these  picturesque 
horsemen,  with  a  group  of  great  black  and  yellow  banners 
flaunting  high  above  them.  There  were  perhaps  a  dozen  of 
these  huge  barbaric  triangular  flags,  hanging  down  so  low 
that  they  literally  draped  their  bearers  and  their  bearers' 
ponies.  The  tramp  of  so  many  countless  hoofs  raised  great 
clouds  of  dust  which  floated  ever  more  densely  and  at  times 
almost  completely  enveloped  the  long  lines  of  men  and 
animals. 

In  the  brilliant  light  flooding  the  roadway  and  catching 
the  violent  red  of  the  men's  tunics — with  the  gaudily 
painted  shop-fronts  framing  it  all — it  made  a  wonderful 
morning  scene. 

For  a  while  this  host  advanced  like  this  in  stern  silence. 
Then  there  were  a  number  of  sun-flashes  as  the  trumpeters 
raised  long  brass  trumpets;  and  instinctively  the  trampling 
ponies  and  the  long  lines  of  men  seemed  to  stiffen  in  antici- 
pation of  what  was  coming.  Suddenly  the  music  began — a 
music  which  once  heard  can  never  be  forgotten.  Beginning 
to  blow  irregularly,  the  trumpeters  first  touched  a  high  note 
and  held  it  in  long,  quavering,  mournful,  thrilling  blasts — 
blasts  which  were  constantly  reinforced  by  the  music  of 
other  trumpeters,  who,  joining  in  this  strange  chorus  as  they 
felt  inclined,  made  the  volume  of  sound  rise  and  sink  in  a 
blood-tingling  manner.  Then,  without  any  warning,  as  if 
a  sudden  exhaustion  forced  them  all  to  it,  the  trumpets 


334  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

dropped  two  octaves  and  roared  in  unison  for  a  few  brief 
seconds  a  tremendous  bass  chorus  which  sounded  like  the 
deep-chested  thunder  of  the  heavens.  It  was  splendid. 

"Oh,  oh!"  cried  Mrs.  Hopeful,  panting  with  excitement 
and  dropping  her  reins. 

"What  is  it?"  everybody  asked. 

"That — that,"  she  answered,  shutting  her  eyes  and  point- 
ing. "Have  you  ever  heard  anything  like  it  in  such  a  setting — 
oh,  those  notes!"  The  little  woman  shivered,  so  excited  had 
she  become. 

The  leading  files  were  not  more  than  forty  or  fifty  yards 
from  them  when  the  youthful  attache  suddenly  showed 
renewed  anxiety.  Once  again  his  mafu  had  ridden  beside 
him,  and  had  talked  volubly. 

"We  must  get  into  the  lane  and  out  of  sight  at  once,"  he 
exclaimed  as  he  understood  what  was  said  to  him.  "My  man 
says  these  are  Tung  Fu-hsiang's  Mohammedan  soldiers,  who 
have  come  from  a  distant  province.  They  are  absolute  bar- 
barians and  have  just  finished  putting  down  a  rebellion. 
They  might  attack  us.  Quick — before  we  are  seen." 

Filled  with  a  new  alarm,  they  forced  their  way  into  the 
lane  in  single  file  and  were  soon  quickly  swallowed  up  in  the 
crowd.  Kerr,  glancing  back,  could  see  that  the  dense 
columns  of  smoke  now  pouring  from  the  buildings  on  fire 
were  attracting  the  soldiery.  Perhaps  they  were  going 
thither — perhaps  they  had  a  special  mission.  In  any  case, 
their  heads  were  all  turned  in  that  direction;  their  party 
had  not  been  seen.  Kerr  breathed  a  sigh  of  relief. 

They  found  that  the  waiting  crowd  in  the  lane  extended 
for  half  a  mile  or  more,  but  in  all  that  concourse  they  did 
not  see  a  sign  of  woman.  The  women  had  hidden  themselves 
at  once:  it  was  one  of  the  most  ominous  signs  of  the  East. 
The  little  party  remembered  now  that  neither  had  they 
seen  that  morning  a  single  official  cart  with  its  customary 
escort  of  outriders.  Had  it  been  generally  understood  that 
this  was  coming? 

Kerr  rode  along  moodily  wondering  to  himself  what  it  all 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  335 

meant.  Things  seemed  to  be  more  involved  than  ever. 
How  could  Europe  ever  understand!  He  was  only  just 
beginning  to — after  all  these  months;  and  yet  what  he 
understood  was  very  little.  What  was  the  use  of  the 
richest  concession  if  it  meant  fire  and  sword  at  any  moment — 
that  is  what  he  wondered;  and  what  would  Lorenzo  have 
to  say,  was  what  he  wondered  next. 

The  rest  of  the  party  were  riding  close  round  the  two 
ladies,  only  thinking  of  what  they  had  seen.  The  youthful 
attache  had  placed  himself  between  the  two  ladies  and  was 
now  talking  importantly. 

"As  soon  as  we  get  outside  the  first  Gate,"  he  was  saying, 
"I  think  I  shall  send  back  a  chit  to  the  chief.  I  am  sure 
no  one  knows  yet  that  those  soldiers  have  been  brought  into 
the  city.  That  they  should  have  come  so  suddenly  is  a  very 
curious  thing;  and  personally  I  believe  that  the  fire  at  that 
big  Yamen  and  their  arrival  were  specially  arranged.  But 
you  can  never  really  know  here — that  I  admit." 

He  nodded  his  head  very  wisely  and  hunted  in  his  pockets 
to  be  sure  he  had  not  lost  his  note-book. 

"But  what  does  it  all  mean,  what  does  it  all  mean?"  cried 
Mrs.  Hopeful  in  agitation.  Until  just  now  she  had  been 
interested  only  in  the  purely  dramatic  and  picturesque  side: 
that  she  might  possibly  have  been  cut  to  pieces  filled  her 
with  panic — when  the  danger  was  by! 

"It  means  anything  or  nothing,"  said  the  attache  crossly. 
He  disliked  being  questioned.  Perhaps  he  had  been  more 
than  a  little  alarmed  himself.  "How  can  I  say  what  it  is? 
Only  China  is  disturbed — very  disturbed." 

"I  know  what  it  means,"  replied  Madame  Boisragon, 
speaking  for  the  first  time. 

"You  know,  my  dear!"  exclaimed  Mrs.  Hopeful,  leaning 
forward  to  look  into  her  face.  "How  can  you  possibly 
know?" 

Madame  Boisragon  coloured  a  little. 

"I  know  what  I  heard  from  my  husband  by  letter  a  few 
days  ago,"  she  said  with  some  hesitation.  Kerr  had  just 


336  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

come  up,  and  she  threw  a  rapid  glance  in  his  direction  to 
see  whether  he  could  hear.  Apparently  he  was  still  buried 
in  his  thoughts. 

"Well?"  said  Mrs.  Hopeful. 

"It  was  nothing  much,"  explained  Madame  Boisragon, 
"but  he  insisted  that  there  was  no  time  to  lose  and  that  in  a 
month  the  whole  political  situation  would  have  changed. 
There  would  be  complete  reaction,  he  said." 

"Do  you  hear  that,  Jack?  We  must  hurry  up  if  our 
schemes  are  to  go  through!" 

Mrs.  Hopeful  leaned  across  and  tapped  tall,  thin  Mr. 
Smith  on  the  shoulder  with  her  whip.  Kerr,  who  had  over- 
heard the  last  few  words,  felt  more  angry  than  ever  for 
some  reason.  He  was  almost  rude  to  one  of  the  other 
men  who  addressed  some  unimportant  remark  to  him.  Sud- 
denly he  wished  that  he  had  taken  Lorenzo's  advice  and 
not  come. 

They  passed  into  the  country  at  length,  and  no  sooner  had 
the  massive  city  walls  sunk  out  of  sight  than  the  incidents 
of  the  early  morning  somehow  faded  completely  away. 
They  might  indeed  have  been  a  thousand  miles  away  from 
Peking  the  potential,  Peking  the  inscrutable.  They  clattered 
through  little  mud  villages  which  knew  nothing  and  cared 
nothing  for  any  mad  city  turmoil — villages  still  sunk  in 
summer  sleep — villages  blissful  in  their  ignorance.  The 
country  carts,  which  emerged  from  roads  now  almost  hidden 
by  the  ripe  crops  of  kaoliang,  or  giant  millet — marvellous 
crops  standing  eight  or  nine  feet  high — politely  stopped  to 
allow  them  to  pass.  Their  drivers  showed  not  a  trace  of 
any  latent  animosity  to  the  European.  It  was  the  city  alone 
which  seemed  infected  with  strange  moods:  here  there  was 
only  summer  peace. 

All  day  they  travelled  through  a  country  covered  with  these 
bounteous  crops;  and  very  late  in  the  evening,  tired  and 
sore  and  burnt,  they  reached  at  last  a  rude  stone-strewn 
village  at  the  foot  of  the  mountains.  Here  they  camped, 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  337 

after  the  manner  of  travellers  in  the  East,  in  a  flea-smitten 
inn.  Carnot,  however,  had  been  as  good  as  his  word,  and 
their  discomforts  were  comparatively  few,  for  their  carts 
had  arrived  and  the  magic  of  their  servants  speedily  overcame 
all  difficulties.  Inquisitive  faces,  it  is  true,  peered  in  on  the 
little  party  through  every  gap  in  the  broken  paper  windows, 
as  they  ate  their  supper,  and  commented  in  guttural  whispers 
on  the  idiosyncrasies  of  the  white  man — but  no  one  minded, 
since  such  things  had  to  be. 

Later  on,  in  the  night  as  they  lay  a  little  sleepless  after 
the  strenuous  day,  the  endless  sound  of  bells  was  borne  to 
them  and  grew  from  hour  to  hour  ever  louder  and  more 
insistent.  The  streets  of  the  rude  little  village  seemed  to  be 
alive  with  bells — clanking  camel-bells,  silver-toned  mule- 
bells,  and  little  tinkling  sheep-bells,  as  well  as  many  other 
kinds.  There  was  one  endless  message  of  bells — bells  com- 
ing and  going;  bells  angrily  protesting  at  the  turning  of 
night  into  day;  bells  sadly  acquiescing  in  the  set  scheme  of 
endless  toil. 

"Did  you  hear  the  bells?"  inquired  every  one  in  the  morn- 
ing— though  one  might  as  well  have  inquired  if  the  bright 
stars  shining  through  the  broken  paper  windows,  or  the  white 
moonlight,  had  been  noticed.  Was  this  not  the  land  of  bells? 

As  the  little  party  came  out,  one  by  one,  on  the  stony  road 
which  ran  past  the  village  inn  to  investigate  matters,  they 
found  that  an  endless  procession  of  camels  that  had  travelled 
down  the  passes  at  night  was  still  blocking  all  traffic.  They 
watched  them  in  silence  for  a  long  time.  Clank-a-clank , 
clank-a-clank,  said  these  bells,  as  their  drivers  slowly  led 
the  beasts  into  corrals  and  allowed  them  to  rest;  and  when 
the  camels  had  finally  made  room,  travel-stained  and  sun- 
blackened  shepherds,  with  little  blue-cloth  packs  on  their 
backs  and  long  staffs  in  their  hands,  began  driving  along 
great  flocks  of  fat-tailed  Mongolian  sheep,  which  raised 
such  a  dust  that  one  almost  choked.  These  bells  said  tink-a- 
tink,  ting-a-tink,  softly  yet  gaily,  because  the  silly  sheep 
thought  they  were  only  going  to  pastures  new. 


338  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

"This  is  enchanting,"  cried  little  Mrs.  Hopeful  as  they 
finally  decided  to  go  on.  "We  are  going  to  have  the  most 
beautiful  time  in  the  world."  And  forthwith  they  started 
up  the  Pass. 

The  village  was  a  veritable  animal-village — a  village  con- 
sisting of  one  endless  stony  street  leading  the  way  towards 
the  Pass.  Every  house  was  a  stable  or  a  grain-shop — rough, 
rude  buildings  dinted  with  work  and  rain  and  storm  and 
snow  and  somehow  very  biblical  in  aspect — and  every  man 
and  woman  and  child  in  the  village  was  a  servant  of  animals. 
Now  animals  were  being  busily  counted,  animals  were  being 
fed,  animals  were  being  watered — there  they  stood,  camels, 
mules,  ponies,  donkeys,  sheep,  goats,  and  pigs,  all  impartially 
mixed  as  in  Noah's  Ark,  gaily  ringing  their  bells  with  every 
movement  and  showing  in  countless  ways  that  there  is  a 
brotherhood  of  four-footed  beasts  just  as  there  is  a  brother- 
hood of  two-legged  men.  The  mountain  air  was  fresh  and 
sweet;  and  though  the  sun  was  already  high  in  the  heavens, 
it  was  very  different  here  from  the  drowsy  plain  below. 

So  with  the  impression  of  these  things  strong  in  them,  the 
little  party  mounted  ever  upwards  along  the  winding  moun- 
tain road,  forsaking  the  crowded  animal  village  with  sudden 
regret,  and  conscious  that  they  were  in  a  new  world  bearing 
but  little  relation  to  the  scenes  they  had  so  recently  left 
behind  them.  Here  everything  was  happy  and  untainted. 

They  passed  through  the  broken  remains  of  a  strong  em- 
battled gateway,  and  very  shortly  they  had  lost  all  sight  of 
human  habitations.  Now  there  was  nothing  but  the  rock- 
strewn,  gaunt  mountain-sides  and  the  stony  roadway. 

Upwards  and  ever  upwards  climbed  the  roadway,  sometimes 
very  steeply,  ascending  as  if  with  a  great  effort,  sometimes 
pushing  on  in  sweeping  curves  which  carried  one  impercep- 
tibly to  a  higher  level.  Water,  crystal-clear  and  so  different 
from  the  dolorous  streams  of  the  plain,  trickled  and  rippled 
in  the  gullies  and  gave  a  renewed  sense  of  freshness  and  pleas- 
antness. Dots  and  puffs  of  dust  high  up  on  the  roadway  met 
the  eyes  of  the  little  party  at  frequent  intervals,  and  as  they 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  339 

came  nearer  to  these  signs  of  life,  a  tinkle  of  music  was 
borne  to  them  ever  more  clearly.  Flocks  of  sheep  or  lines 
of  pack-animals  were  approaching.  The  drivers,  sometimes 
mounted  on  a  mule  or  a  camel,  sang  to  themselves  in  this 
solitude,  and  when  they  came  abreast  of  this  little  party  of 
wayfarers  hardly  did  more  than  turn  their  sleepy  eyes 
towards  them.  What  did  they  care?  They  were  men  of 
the  road,  fated  until  old  age  or  death  released  them  from 
this  toil  to  travel  up  and  down  between  grassy  Mongolia 
and  sunburnt  China. 

There  are  monuments,  too,  on  this  roadway — history  was 
strewn  there  in  broken,  disconnected  pieces,  to  be  read  by 
those  who  care  to  read.  Sometimes  on  the  shoulders  of  a 
towering  height  would  be  the  ruined  remains  of  a  grey 
watch-tower;  or  on  the  very  road  itself  would  stand  a 
gateway  with  the  great  iron-sheathed  gates  still  withstanding 
the  ravages  of  time,  and  showing  how  this  road,  in  case  of 
necessity,  had  been  sternly  barred  against  all  travellers. 
Broken  blocks  of  carved  stone  lay  in  masses — forgotten, 
uncared  for,  only  marking  how  once  each  inch  of  this  way 
was  more  precious  than  silver  and  gold  and  must  be  held 
to  the  death  by  devoted  train-bands.  Now  the  barren 
mountain-sides,  once  the  scene  of  many  encampments,  were 
only  enlivened  by  an  occasional  camel-corral  in  which  a  few 
camels,  sick  or  weary  from  too  much  toil,  were  reposing 
under  the  guard  of  a  solitary  man  who  sat  perched  on  a 
rock  eyeing  the  traffic  of  the  winding  road  with  unmeaning 
looks.  And  in  this  wise,  not  speaking  much  and  greedily 
drinking  in  this  new  aspect  of  Chinese  life,  hour  after  hour 
the  little  party  slowly  crept  up  the  Pass. 

The  vast  work  they  had  come  so  far  to  see  took  them  all 
by  surprise.  At  every  turning  during  one  whole  hour  they 
had  craned  their  necks  and  tried  to  discover  it  in  vain:  a 
dozen  times  they  had  chorused  their  disappointment — and 
even  said  that  they  disbelieved  in  its  existence,  as  once  upon 
a  time  erudite  writers  stupidly  disbelieved,  And  then,  sud- 
denly, there  it  was, 


340  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

Calmly,  indifferently,  yet  majestically  creeping  on  its  way; 
climbing  without  effort  the  tallest  peaks  and  slipping  down 
the  deepest  slopes;  with  square  watch-towers  always  rising 
regularly  at  the  stated  intervals  and  giving  it  a  frowning 
and  fearless  aspect  amidst  the  sea  of  rugged  mountains — 
there  ran  the  grey  outline  of  the  Great  Wall  of  China  on 
its  endless  journey  to  Central  Asia  in  utmost  solitude  and 
now  entirely  deserted  by  man.  ...  It  was  splendid. 

"Isn't  it  perfect?"  called  little  Mrs.  Hopeful  in  poetic 
ecstasy,  as  she  breathlessly  surveyed  the  classic  work;  and 
then,  without  waiting  for  an  answer,  she  suddenly  scampered 
through  a  fortified  and  half-deserted  muleteers'  village  to 
gain  the  summit  as  soon  as  possible. 

They  dismounted  in  a  party  a  few  hundred  feet  below  the 
work  and  scrambled  up  a  pathway.  In  very  few  minutes 
they  had  mounted  the  wall  itself  and  were  walking  up  the 
sloping  platform  to  the  tallest  part  they  could  see. 

All  the  afternoon  they  sat  or  walked  about  in  perfect  hap- 
piness. It  was  almost  as  if  they  were  on  the  roof  of  the 
world.  To  the  north  and  west  were  nothing  but  rugged 
mountains;  to  the  south  and  east  the  vast  alluvial  plains  of 
China — now  one  laughing  summer  cornland  flashing  in  the 
sun  and  most  pleasant  to  the  eye.  Distance  no  doubt  lent 
enchantment;  contrast  with  cityless  and  unfilled  plains 
enhanced  its  riches ;  but  at  least  it  was  clear  from  here  above 
why  this  Chinese  land  had  always  appeared  in  the  past  to 
the  outer  barbarians  so  delectable.  It  was  the  lure  of  these 
plains  which  had  made  them  cascade  into  the  country  in  re- 
lentless hordes;  it  was  the  Alps  and  Italy  over  again.  .  .  . 

Night  came  slowly  and  reluctantly  on  the  top  of  these  moun- 
tains, but  patiently  the  little  party  waited.  They  watched 
the  sun-ball's  last  glow  disappear  in  the  west  and  turned 
their  eyes  to  the  cold  light  of  the  moon,  which  had  already 
risen.  Clearer  and  clearer  did  the  silver  light  become,  until 
it  rilled  heaven  and  earth  in  a  flood  of  unbelievable  bright- 
ness. There  was  not  a  cloud,  not  a  speck  on  the  dome  of 
rich  blue;  and  now  in  the  night  the  great  Wall  seemed  to 


THE   HUMAN    COBWEB  341 

creep  along  like  some  living  thing,  its  most  distant  curves 
lighted  up  in  icelike  coldness.  All  the  world  now  slept: 
the  Wall  alone  was  wakeful,  prepared  to  fulfill  its  task  and 
watch  the  frontier  until  the  crack  of  doom.  .  .  . 

"I  could  sit  here  forever,"  murmured  Mrs.  Hopeful  at 
length.  "Oh,  let  us  not  go  until  dawn." 

Only  when  the  moon  was  waning  did  they  think  of  moving, 
and  then  they  spent  the  beginning  of  day  in  wending  their 
way  down.  It  had  indeed  been  an  experience. 

That  same  afternoon  they  went  to  the  Tombs  of  the  Thir- 
teen Mings,  which  are  set  in  a  jewel-like  amphitheatre  of 
green  hills  and  have  a  world-famous  avenue  of  stone  animals 
leading  to  their  vast  halls.  But  somehow  the  memory  of  that 
moonlight  and  the  silent  night  kept  them  from  enjoying  this 
second  sight  as  they  should  have  done — for  in  the  sunlight 
they  could  only  think  of  the  moonlight  and  the  majestic 
work  which  had  so  sleeplessly  watched  for  more  than  twenty 
centuries  over  the  safety  of  these  plains. 


CHAPTER  XXIV 

"On  s'attend  a  tout,  et  on  n'est  jamais  prepaid 
a  rien." — MME.  SWETCHINE. 

A  LINE  of  Peking  carts  was  drawn  up  in  front  of  the  hotel 
when  the  party  rode  in  from  their  diverting  expedition.  In 
the  dusk  they  could  just  see  any  number  of  boxes  and  pack- 
ages being  carried  indoors;  so  there  were  new  arrivals  and 
new  intrigues  preparing!  As  soon  as  they  had  bid  each 
other  au  revoir,  Kerr  went  hurriedly  in  search  of  Lorenzo. 

Lorenzo  was  in  the  hall,  waiting  for  him,  having  heard 
the  noise  of  their  arrival. 

"Well?"  said  Peter  Kerr  a  little  anxiously,  after  they  had 
exchanged  greetings.  Somehow  he  had  the  feeling  that  he 
would  hear  something  unpleasant;  his  companion's  first 
words  at  once  confirmed  this.  Lorenzo  was  not  in  a  good 
humour  and  showed  it. 

"Things  are  not  well,"  he  replied  gruffly.  "I  required  your 
presence  urgently  two  days  ago,  and  there  was  no  means  of 
getting  at  you.  What  the  devil  made  you  go  at  such  a  time  as 
this?" 

"What  has  happened?"  asked  Kerr,  not  wishing  to  hear 
further  recriminations. 

"You  have  not  heard?"  said  Lorenzo  incredulously. 

Kerr  shook  his  head. 

"There  has  been  a  coup  d'etat"  said  Lorenzo  lugubriously. 
"We  don't  know  any  real  details  about  it  yet  save  what  the 
Edicts  say — which  is,  that  the  old  Empress  has  taken  things 
into  her  hands  again  and  that  the  young  Emperor  and  his 
reforms  are  discredited.  Some  say  that  the  Emperor  is  a 
prisoner  and  some  say  he  is  really  dead." 

Kerr  whistled  thoughtfully.  "That  accounts  for  what  we 
saw,"  he  said,  and  thereupon  he  detailed  to  Lorenzo  the^ 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  343 

strange  fire  they  had  witnessed  and  the  sudden  arrival  of 
that  avalanche  of  cavalry. 

When  he  had  finished,  as  Lorenzo  said  nothing,  he  turned 
to  their  own  affairs. 

"Do  you  think  it  possible  that  the  others  have  stolen  a 
march  on  us  during  this  interval?"  he  inquired. 

"I  don't  know,"  answered  Lorenzo  gloomily.  "That  is 
why  I  am  angry.  If  I  only  knew!  Unfortunately  I  have 
my  suspicions,  and  we  should  have  gone  to  the  old  Prince 
and  pushed  our  claims  on  his  attention  again." 

Still  discussing  matters,  the  two  men  went  to  the  hotel-bar 
and  ordered  something  to  drink.  The  room  was  nearly  full 
of  the  new  arrivals — tired  and  dusty  from  their  long  ride  in 
from  the  railway-station. 

"Listen  to  them  cackle,"  said  Lorenzo  disdainfully.  "They 
are  Frenchmen,  Belgians — a  whole  horde  has  arrived.  Of 
course  their  business  is  coming  to  a  head.  They  have  shown 
immense  energy  during  the  last  few  months.  I  am  sure 
their  contracts  are  as  good  as  in  their  pockets;  whilst  our 
contracts " 

He  twisted  the  glass  the  boy  had  handed  him  irritably  to 
and  fro  in  his  hand,  and  frowned  in  silent  anger. 

"I  have  done  what  I  could  without  you,"  he  continued 
finally,  "but  when  I  received  warning  that  this  was  coming 
three  days  ago,  we  should  have  been  ready  and  have  gone  and 
sat  down  by  the  side  of  that  Prince  until  we  got  his  promise 
to  move  at  once.  We  should  have  stayed  with  him  a  whole 
night  if  necessary.  Now  it  may  be  too  late." 

"But  we  got  his  formal  promise  last  time  we  saw  him," 
argued  Peter  Kerr.  "He  would  have  only  repeated  that.  If 
it  can't  be  done,  it  can't  be  done." 

Lorenzo  laughed  a  short  staccato  laugh. 

"I  am  afraid,"  he  said,  "that  you  will  never  understand  the 
heavenly  system  of  this  delightful  country.  A  promise  of 
that  sort  is  only  a  promise  if  it  can  be  enforced  at  the  right 
time.  That  is  the  important  point.  When  that  psychologi- 
cal moment  is  past  only  God  Almighty  could  perform  the 


344  THE    HUMAN   COBWEB 

miracle  of  getting  what  has  been  promised  carried  into  effect. 
It  is  all  a  game  of  chess  and  nothing  but  a  game  of  chess." 

Peter  Kerr  drank  down  his  whisky-and-soda  before  reply- 
ing. He  likewise  was  now  considerably  irritated,  but  he  was 
wise  enough  not  to  wish  to  show  it. 

"Perhaps  I  have  not  understood,"  he  admitted  finally.  "But 
the  main  question  now  is  what  to  do  next.  I  am  willing  to 
follow  your  advice  at  once,  no  matter  what  it  costs.  Tell 
me  what  to  do  and  I  will  act." 

Lorenzo  visibly  relented.  He  was  always  flattered  when 
Kerr  deferred  to  him. 

"We  ran  do  nothing  to-night,"  he  said  more  calmly.  "I 
shall  try  and  find  out  by  to-morrow  morning  what  these 
people  are  really  up  to.  Then  we  can  act.  I  wonder  very 
modi  mheihci  that  man  Boisragon  is  coming  too." 

Kerr  shifted  his  position  ever  so  slightly.  A  servant  en- 
tering the  room  with  an  immense  stack  of  envelopes  and  pa- 
pers saved  him  from  the  necessity  of  answering.  Most  of 
the  mafl  matter  was  for  him,  and  Lorenzo  continued  to  study 
him  curiously  as  he  rapidly  glanced  at  the  addresses.  It 
seemed  that  every  person  he  had  ever  known  had  written 
to  him,  for  there  were  big  envelopes  and  >maIT  envelopes,  and 
long  envelopes  and  square  envelopes,  with  a  variety  of  stamps 
almoc^  large  enough  to  begin  a  collection  with. 

"Well,  I  must  go  through  these,"  he  said  finally,  gathering 
up  his  correspondence,  "'By  to-morrow  we  ought  to  know 
vilul  to  do. 

He  nodded  to  Lorenzo  and  passed  out  into  the  hall  on  his 
way  upstairs.  Half-way  up  he  met  Mrs,  Hopeful  coining 
down, 

"Oh,  you  too!  she  rrriainicd,  pointing  at  his  letters.  "I 
hope  your  correspondence  does  not  hare  a  bad  effect  on  jou! 
Jack  has  a  pile  that  makes  him  quite  impossible.  Our  scheme 
seems  hnpflrnv  to-night,  and  Jack  is  deep  down  in  the  dumps. 
It  is  so  provoking  after  our  lovely  trip.  The  only  person  who 
vrun  really  luppy  is  Madame  Boisragon.*9 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  345 

"Oh,"  said  Peter  Kerr,  suddenly  pricking  up  his  ears.  "Is 
that  so?" 

"Yes,"  sighed  Mrs.  Hopeful,  beginning  to  go  on.  "She 
seems  to  have  all  the  luck.  Apparently  her  husband's  busi- 
ness is  booming.  All  these  new  arrivals  are  in  the  same 
syndicate,  you  know,"  and  with  that  she  disappeared. 

Kerr  sat  down  in  his  rooms  to  read  his  letters  in  a  some- 
what savage  mood.  Instinctively  he  avoided  communica- 
tions from  his  own  men  at  work  in  the  provinces,  and  sought 
out  first  those  letters  which  appeared  not  likely  to  be  capable 
of  annoying  him.  Had  he  done  exactly  the  opposite  he  would 
have  saved  himself  some  annoyance.  For  when  at  last  he 
came  to  the  letters  from  his  various  survey-parties,  he  found 
that  they  contained  data  which  quickly  changed  his  mood. 
Practically  all  the  routes  had  been  satisfactorily  settled  on, 
and  as  a  result  of  the  rough  preliminary  surveys  which  had 
now  been  completed  Kerr  was  advised  that  it  would  be  pos- 
sible to  reduce  materially  the  original  estimates  of  cost.  No 
engineering  difficulties  of  any  sort  which  had  not  been  an- 
ticipated had  been  encountered,  and  a  practical  knowledge 
of  the  country  now  confirmed  most  of  his  original  assump- 
tions. 

By  the  time  he  had  finished  reading  he  was  in  a  very  dif- 
ferent mood.  He  arranged  his  papers  and  began  planning 
what  he  should  do  on  the  morrow.  It  would  now  be  pos- 
sible to  make  definite  tenders — with  the  aid  of  the  interpret- 
ers he  would  have  all  these  estimates  and  plans  put  into 
Chinese,  as  Lorenzo  had  been  constantly  advising  him  to  do. 
He  had  not  felt  it  safe  to  do  this  previously,  for  he  did  not 
like  committing  himself  so  definitely.  Now,  with  his  fresh 
data,  he  knew  exactly  what  he  could  undertake.  He  was 
greatly  relieved. 

Presently,  after  he  had  dressed  himself,  he  went  along  the 
verandah. 

"Can  I  come  in?"  he  said,  tapping  on  the  wooden  shutters, 

"Is  that  you?"  called  Madame  Boisragon. 


346  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

"Yes." 

"I  am  lying  down,"  she  replied  in  a  tone  which  somehow 
belied  her  statement.  "I  have  a  nasty  headache  from  the 
sun.  I  want  to  rest." 

"Oh,  I  am  sorry,"  said  Peter  Kerr  in  a  tone  of  sharp  dis- 
appointment. "I  hope  it  will  pass." 

He  waited  to  hear  if  she  had  anything  more  to  say,  but 
Madame  Boisragon  remained  silent,  and  so,  reluctantly,  he 
went  away. 

That  same  evening  Baroness  Waffen  had  a  few  people  to 
dinner  in  her  Legation.  The  dinner  had  been  more  lively 
than  the  run  of  such  dull  little  affairs,  for  every  one  was 
somewhat  excited  with  the  unexpected  turn  political  mat- 
ters had  taken  in  the  old  capital,  and  there  was  no  end  to 
the  flood  of  speculations  which  was  unloosened.  The  dip- 
lomatic world,  having  been  openly  alarmed  during  the  past 
few  days,  had  telegraphed  voluminously  for  instructions,  and 
it  was  now  no  longer  a  secret  that  guards  were  coming  to 
protect  the  Legations — about  four  hundred  sailors  in  all. 
It  was  generally  admitted  that  the  situation  justified  such  a 
novel  departure. 

"They  are  cutting  off  heads  like  cabbages  in  the  Palace,  I 
hear,"  said  De  Boyar,  "and  that  old  Empress  also  has  had 
any  number  of  eunuchs  thrashed  to  death." 

"I  wonder  what  will  happen  to  the  opera  bouffe,"  asked 
the  sarcastic  man  who  had  been  so  disagreeable  a  few  weeks 
before  on  the  subject  of  Mr.  Smith. 

"What  do  you  mean?"  inquired  Baroness  Waffen. 

"The  hotel  and  the  concessionnaires,"  he  explained;  "I  have 
christened  them  the  Peking  opera  bouffe.  What  will  happen 
to  all  those  dear  people?" 

"I  suppose  they  will  continue  to  seek  concessions  just  the 
same." 

The  sarcastic  man  shook  his  head  and  smiled. 

"I  cannot  believe  it,"  he  said.  "The  company  will  have 
to  break  up.  Carnot  will  paste  on  his  front  door  'RELACHE' 


THE  HUMAN   COBWEB  347 

in  large  letters — and  all  the  ingenues  and  the  villains  and 
the  funny  men  and  the  thin  men  and  the  fat  men  will  go 
their  several  ways.  Business  will  become  rather  bad  when 
the  Chinese  see  our  Legation  guards.  They  will  not  want 
railways  built  or  mines  opened  or  rivers  dyked — or  any  of 
those  other  amusing  things  which  never  get  beyond  the  paper 
stage." 

Baroness  Waffen  laughed :  the  man  was  really  rather  amus- 
ing. 

"I  shall  be  sorry  if  they  all  go,"  she  said;  "it  will  be  deadly 
dull  this  winter  without  any  outside  element.  Besides,  the 
company  has  some  nice  members." 

The  sarcastic  man  made  a  grimace,  hesitated,  and  then  be- 
came merely  sententious.  He  was  a  little  afraid,  being  only 
a  second  secretary,  to  be  quite  frank  before  his  superiors. 

"The  world  is  a  remarkable  place,"  he  said  unoriginally. 


CHAPTER  XXV 

"Era  la  notte,  e  non  si  vedea  lume."— ARIOSTO, 
Orlando  Furioso. 

"THINGS  have  become  dreadful,"  said  Mrs.  Hopeful  to  the 
little  knot  of  men  in  the  hotel  hall  a  few  days  later.  "You 
are  all  as  gloomy  as  if  the  end  of  the  world  were  not  only  in 
sight  but  about  to  take  place — let  us  say  to-morrow  morning. 
Confound  all  concessions,  say  I." 

"What  can  you  expect,  madame?"  said  Lorenzo,  with  his 
exaggerated  politeness.  "This  counter-revolution  in  the  Pal- 
ace has  made  things  infinitely  worse  than  the  Emperor's  silly 
experiment  of  two  months  ago.  With  the  Emperor  a  pris- 
oner in  the  hands  of  that  terrible  old  Empress  Dowager  and 
those  thousands  of  savage  troops  encamped  round  the  city, 
business  prospects  are  rather  gloomy." 

He  said  all  this  so  fluently  that  Kerr  looked  at  him  sharply. 
He  might  have  been  a  showman  rattling  off  a  set  speech. 
There  was  certainly  something  undefinable  in  his  manner 
which  belied  his  words.  And  as  he  had  only  just  come  in 
after  being  absent  the  greater  part  of  the  day,  Kerr  began 
wondering  what  Lorenzo  had  been  up  to  and  whom  he  had 
seen. 

"I  shall  give  it  up  very  soon  unless  I  have  some  encourage- 
ment," said  tall  Mr.  Smith,  referring  to  his  own  affairs, 
which  were  rather  a  laughing-stock. 

"I  shall  be  glad  when  you  do,"  sighed  Mrs.  Hopeful. 
"Think  of  civilized  people  resolutely  camping  in  this  city  for 
countless  months  to  beg  privileges.  I  think  it  rather  de- 
meaning. This  morning,  being  bored  to  extinction,  I  began 
discussing  the  matter  with  my  boy.  He  summed  up  the  sit- 
uation in  a  quaint  way.  'Mississee,'  said  he,  'just  now  Joss 
belong  bad' — meaning  that  the  gods  are  against  one.  Why 


THE    HUMAN   COBWEB  349 

do  we  not  admit  it  frankly  like  these  philosophic  natives?" 

"The  darkest  hour  is  before  the  dawn,"  sententiously  said 
a  little  Dutchman  who  was  seeking  a  dyking  contract  on  the 
Yellow  River.  "I  am  a  great  believer  in  the  swing  of  the 
pendulum.  Also  I  am  a  fatalist." 

"Heavens!"  exclaimed  Mrs.  Hopeful,  jumping  up  from 
the  cane  chair  on  which  she  had  been  sitting. 

"What  is  the  matter?"  everybody  asked,  thinking  some- 
thing had  stung  her. 

"I  have  just  thought  of  something.  Come  here,  Jack,  and 
you,  Mr.  Lorenzo,  and  you,  Mr.  Kerr." 

She  drew  the  three  men  off  in  a  corner. 

"None  of  you  are  engaged  to-night,  are  you?"  she  inquired 
anxiously.  Their  answers  reassured  her. 

"Thank  fortune,"  she  went  on,  "for  to-night  is  the  thir- 
teenth and  I've  several  men  coming  for  that  seance  which  we 
have  spoken  about  so  often." 

"Oh,"  said  Lorenzo  doubtfully,  "cannot  you  get  on  without 
me?" 

"No,"  protested  Mrs.  Hopeful,  "you  are  one  of  the  very 
men  I  want  most  of  all.  You  must  be  of  the  party." 

"Very  well,"  said  Lorenzo  resignedly;  "but  if  that  is  so, 
Kerr  and  I  will  have  to  finish  up  some  business  now." 

"I  am  going  to  see  about  Madame  Boisragon,"  said  Mrs. 
Hopeful,  starting  off.  "Remember,  we  rendezvous  at  ten 
o'clock  sharp  here  in  the  hall." 

A  few  minutes  later  Lorenzo  accompanied  Kerr  to  his 
rooms.  He  closed  the  door  carefully  before  saying  a  word, 
and  then  went  and  stared  for  a  minute  or  two  out  of  the 
window. 

"Success  is  in  sight,"  he  said  at  length,  coming  back  and 
quietly  sitting  down. 

"What!"  exclaimed  Kerr  incredulously.  "What  do  you 
mean?"  He  stood  waiting  on  the  other  man's  answer  in  an 
attitude  of  suspense. 

Lorenzo  took  out  his  heavy  pocketbook,  and  extracted 
therefrom  a  piece  of  lined  paper. 


350  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

"The  Prince  requests  that  you  will  attend  to-morrow  morn- 
ing at  eleven  o'clock,  with  your  estimates  and  plans  all  ready, 
when  they  will  be  submitted  at  once  to  the  Throne,"  he 
read  aloud.  Then  he  raised  his  eyes  and  watched  Kerr  with 
peculiar  intentness. 

"What  do  you  think  of  that?"  he  asked. 

"But  this  is  very  remarkable,"  exclaimed  Kerr,  walking  ex- 
citedly up  and  down  the  room,  "especially  as  it  comes  when 
everything  seems  topsy-turvy.  How  about  the  others  who 
were  going  to  drive  us  clean  out  of  the  market?"  He 
laughed  almost  boisterously  in  his  sudden  glee. 

"Hush,"  said  Lorenzo,  getting  up  and  walking  to  the  ve- 
randah windows.  "My  dear  fellow,  you  must  be  more  cau- 
tious. The  battle  is  only  beginning :  nothing  is  yet  won.  On 
the  contrary,  the  slightest  slip  will  bring  us  to  grief.  If 
this  comes  off  the  way  I  anticipate,  it  will  be  a  master- 
stroke." 

He  stood  silent  just  on  the  window-sill  and  peered  suspi- 
ciously down  the  verandah.  Then  he  turned  and  sharply 
faced  Kerr  again. 

"The  slightest  slip  will  bring  us  to  grief,"  he  repeated  with 
marked  emphasis.  "I  would  like  you  to  understand  that." 

Kerr  had  gone  to  his  despatch-boxes  and  did  not  answer 
these  remarks.  He  knew  perfectly  what  Lorenzo  implied: 
he  intended  to  let  it  pass  in  his  customary  way. 

"Everything  has  fitted  in  remarkably  well,"  he  said,  arrang- 
ing some  papers  and  clipping  them  together.  "We  have  all 
the  surveys  and  figures  now  in  Chinese.  Those  two  interpret- 
ers are  devilish  slow,  but  they  have  at  last  finished." 

He  pulled  out  a  big  linen-lined  envelope  and  began  filling 
in  on  the  cover  a  description  of  the  various  documents  that 
had  been  completed  only  that  afternoon. 

Lorenzo  watched'  him  in  silence  for  some  time. 

"I  advise  you  to  have  everything  arranged  before  dinner," 
he  said,  "as  we  shall  have  to  start  to-morrow  morning  at 
half-past  nine  sharp,  and  there  is  that  engagement  with  Mrs. 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  351 

Hopeful  to  occupy  us  the  whole  evening.  It  was  rather  neat 
the  way  I  arranged  this  last  move.  I  will  tell  you  about  it  at 
dinner." 

He  got  up  and  began  tramping  up  and  down  the  room, 
pulling  at  his  beard  and  snapping  his  fingers.  It  was  so  cu- 
rious that  Kerr  stopped  writing  for  a  minute  and  contem- 
plated him  in  surprise. 

"I  believe  you  are  excited,  Lorenzo,"  he  remarked. 

The  Italian  paused  in  his  walk. 

"I  am  not  only  excited,"  he  confessed  slowly,  "but  I  feel 
highly  nervous,  which  is  a  much  more  serious  thing." 

"What,"  exclaimed  Kerr  incredulously,  "you  of  all  men!" 

"Yes,"  said  the  Italian  simply,  "I  am  beginning  to  feel  it 
acutely.  If  it  were  to  last  much  longer "  He  did  not  con- 
clude, but  made  a  violent  movement  with  his  hands  as  if  he 
would  throw  everything  away. 

"Perhaps,"  he  resumed,  beginning  to  pace  up  and  down 
again,  "it  is  because  I  have  had  a  devil  of  a  day.  I  believe 
I  have  talked  for  eight  hours  without  stopping.  It  is  a  long 
spell." 

"Better  take  things  easy  and  have  a  rest,"  counselled  Kerr. 

"I  would  go  to  bed  now  were  it  not  for  my  promise  to  Mrs. 
Hopeful,"  he  answered. 

"Let  us  enjoy  a  small  bottle,"  replied  Kerr,  getting  up  to 
ring  his  bell ;  "that  will  make  you  feel  better."  And  under- 
standing well  how  the  other  man  was  feeling,  he  tried  his 
best  to  distract  his  attention. 

Lorenzo  and  Kerr  were  the  first  two  in  the  hall  after  din- 
ner. They  sat  talking  to  each  other  in  low  tones  whilst 
they  waited  for  the  others.  Madame  Boisragon  had  dined 
with  Mrs.  Hopeful  and  had  now  gone  off  with  her  for  a  few 
minutes:  Mr.  Smith  was  engaged  in  seeing  what  would  be 
the  most  suitable  room  for  the  seance  before  the  other  people 
arrived. 

Lorenzo  was  in  a  much  better  frame  of  mind  now  and  was 
talking  cheerfully  enough,  though  he  confessed  he  wished 
the  morning  had  come. 


352  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

"I  believe,"  said  Kerr  laughingly,  "that  you  are  half  afraid 
of  this  alleged  spiritualism." 

The  Italian  looked  at  him  in  a  curious  manner.  His  ex- 
pression hesitated  between  a  smile  and  a  frown. 

"Well,"  he  said,  "you  have  guessed  the  truth.  I  dislike  such 
things  intensely." 

"Why?"  inquired  the  other  a  little  wonderingly. 

"Because  they  bring  bad  luck — they  attract  bad  luck.  I  am 
quite  sure  of  it." 

"You  cannot  really  believe  such  a  thing,"  protested  Kerr. 
"You  do  not  mean  to  tell  me  that  doing  certain  things  can 
have  any  possible  effect  on  future  events." 

"I  do  believe  it,"  said  Lorenzo  superstitiously,  "and  not 
only  do  I  believe  it  but  I  am  certain  of  it.  I  have  had  some 
anxious  experiences." 

"My  dear  fellow,"  said  Kerr,  laughing  and  getting  up  as 
the  two  ladies  came  downstairs,  "you  are  confounding  coin- 
cidence with  cause  and  effect.  Your  attitude  is  ridiculous." 

"I  don't  know  what  we  are  going  to  do,"  said.  Mrs.  Hope- 
ful plaintively,  as  she  came  up ;  "we  cannot  find  a  room  that 
is  quiet  enough  in  this  wretched  little  hotel.  Downstairs  is 
hopeless." 

She  went  forward  and  greeted  the  two  other  men  who  had 
just  come  in.  Then  she  came  back  to  Kerr. 

"Mr.  Kerr,"  she  said,  "will  you  really  mind  if  we  use  your 
sitting-room?  It  is  the  only  place  I  can  think  of:  otherwise 
we  shall  have  the  whole  thing  up.  The  wretched  servants 
make  far  too  much  noise  on  this  floor  to  get  any  results,  I  am 
sure." 

"My  rooms  are  at  your  disposal,"  said  Kerr  politely,  though 
her  request  took  him  by  surprise. 

"Thank  you,"  said  the  little  woman  warmly;  "it  is  really 
sweet  of  you,  Mr.  Kerr.  You  are  always  so  kind.  You 
know  Mr.  Castilho,  don't  you  ?" 

De  Boyar  and  the  Spaniard  Castilho  joined  the  little  group, 
and  after  a  few  minutes  the  whole  party  went  upstairs,  talk- 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  353 

ing  volubly — for  there  is  nothing  in  the  world  like  a  mixture 
of  nationalities  to  set  tongues  a-clacking. 

"Are  we  all  here?"  asked  Mrs.  Hopeful,  jerking  her  head 
rapidly  in  every  direction,  as  soon  as  they  were  in  the  sitting- 
room.  She  was  all  nerves  to-night,  and  betrayed  her  ex- 
citement, even  when  she  was  standing  still,  in  the  manner  in 
which  she  clasped  and  unclasped  her  hands  and  flashed  her 
eyes.  Tall,  thin,  polite  Mr.  Smith  watched  her  from  the 
middle  distance  in  open  trepidation,  as  if  he  suspected  that 
her  mood  might  induce  extraordinary  developments.  There 
was  something  pathetic  and  even  haunting  in  his  strange 
manner:  he  was  like  the  bird  on  the  tree,  and  she  the  snake 
enchanting  him. 

"I  think  we  are  all  here,"  answered  Peter  Kerr,  after  a 
pause.  "Yes,  we  are  seven,  so  that's  all  right.  Now,  Mrs. 
Hopeful,  won't  you  prepare  the  mise  en  scene®  You  can 
turn  everything  upside  down  if  you  want  to." 

He  offered  her  the  freedom  of  his  rooms  with  a  smile  and 
a  wave  of  his  hand. 

"Nothing  is  needed  but  complete  darkness,  complete  silence 
— and  a  large  three-legged  table,"  she  answered  monoto- 
nously, as  if  she  were  reciting  something  learnt  by  heart. 
"Now,  let  me  investigate." 

She  walked  rapidly  to  the  windows  and  examined  the  night. 

"The  night  is  dark,"  she  said  mysteriously,  as  if  she  were 
speaking  to  herself.  "There  is  no  moon  to  shine,  and  even 
the  little  stars  have  gone  to  bed."  She  stood  motionless. 
"Everything  is  right — quite  right,"  she  concluded. 

Quickly  she  bent  down,  and  herself  unhooked  the  heavy 
wooden  shutters  before  any  one  had  time  to  come  forward 
and  assist  her. 

"They  must  be  shut,"  she  said  to  Peter  Kerr,  who  was  wait- 
ing for  her  instructions.  "The  windows  as  well  as  the  shut- 
ters— everything." 

She  stepped  back  into  the  middle  of  the  room  and  watched 
him  carry  this  out.  The  others  had  begun  to  occupy  them- 


354  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

selves  in  various  ways  until  their  attention  should  be  de- 
manded. Lorenzo  and  Smith  were  now  standing  expect- 
antly with  their  hands  in  their  pockets,  exchanging  a  few  re- 
marks; the  Spaniard  Castilho  was  examining  some  photo- 
graphs; De  Boyar,  for  a  wonder,  was  silently  reading  a 
paper;  and  alone  Madame  Boisragon  was  seated  with  her 
chin  on  her  hand.  Her  tall  figure  and  her  distinguished 
head,  so  well  poised  on  her  shoulders,  contrasted  oddly  with 
little  Mrs.  Hopeful's  sylphlike  personality.  Mrs.  Hopeful 
was  a  little  magnet:  she,  in  her  black  dress,  looked  somehow 
like  iron. 

Madame  Boisragon's  eyes  wandered  aimlessly  round  the 
room  until  they  alighted  on  the  small  table  beside  her,  on 
which  were  two  leather-covered  despatch-boxes.  Something 
must  have  attracted  her  attention;  for  suddenly  she  shifted 
her  position,  and  soon,  with  a  quick,  nervous  glance  around 
her,  she  got  up  and  very  deliberately  stood  with  her  back 
towards  the  rest  of  the  people. 

She  remained  motionless  for  a  moment  in  this  attitude. 
Then  very  deftly  she  dropped  the  handkerchief  she  had  in 
her  hand  on  the  despatch-boxes,  and  as  she  recovered  it  she 
flipped  a  large  envelope  on  top  of  the  boxes  round. 

She  was  so  interested  in  deciphering  the  superscription  that 
Mrs.  Hopeful's  voice  made  her  start  violently  before  she  had 
entirely  satisfied  her  curiosity.  She  contrived,  however,  to 
turn  without  any  one  noticing  her  peculiar  preoccupation. 

"That  is  all  right  now,  Mr.  Kerr,"  Mrs.  Hopeful  was  say- 
ing in  her  nervous  manner.  "The  first  condition  will  be  ful- 
filled. Now  how  about  complete  silence?" 

Kerr  paused  and  thought  a  bit. 

"The  only  thing  I  can  suggest,"  he  said  finally,  "is  that  I 
get  my  boy  up  and  post  him  at  the  top  of  the  stairs  with  ex- 
plicit instructions  to  stop  any  one  coming  near.  Nobody  will 
probably  attempt  to  disturb  us,  but  that  will  make  it  abso- 
lutely safe."  Kerr  was  beginning  to  enter  thoroughly  into 
the  spirit  of  the  thing.  v 

"Good,  very  good,"  cried  Mrs.  Hopeful  in  relieved  tones. 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  355 

"Tell  him  that  it  is  devil-business  and  that  if  he  doesn't  play 
his  part  the  devil  will  come  to  him." 

Kerr  laughed  and  rang  his  bell ;  and  whilst  they  were  wait- 
ing Mrs.  Hopeful  lectured  everybody  once  more  on  -the  im- 
portance of  being  in  earnest.  Her  mood  had  begun  to  com- 
municate itself  to  all  the  others — for  though  at  the  beginning 
several  had  been  openly  sceptical,  now  no  one  made  any 
facetious  reply. 

"I  am  sure  we  will  get  results  to-night,"  concluded  Mrs. 
Hopeful.  "Still,  though  I  am  so  sure,  all  of  you  must  be 
good  and  try  your  best." 

"I  am  already  beginning  to  tremble,"  said  the  irrepressible 
De  Boyar,  who  believed  thoroughly  in  spirits,  good  and  bad 
alike.  He  pretended  to  laugh,  but  his  usual  manner  had  de- 
parted. 

The  boy,  having  duly  appeared,  listened  unenthusiastically 
to  his  master's  instructions.  It  was  only  one  more  of  the  for- 
eigners' mad  freaks;  and  so  resignedly  he  prepared  to  mount 
guard  as  he  had  been  told  at  the  head  of  the  stairs.  The 
party  watched  him  through  the  open  door  with  suppressed 
amusement  as  he  carefully  seated  himself  with  his  eyes  turned 
towards  the  head  of  the  staircase. 

"He  will  go  to  sleep,  I'm  sure,"  commented  De  Boyar  as 
they  shut  the  door. 

"Now  we  want  a  table,"  said  Mrs.  Hopeful,  "and  then  the 
play  can  commence.  Let  me  see." 

Her  eyes  quickly  examined  the  merits  of  the  various  tables 
in  the  room. 

"That  one,  of  course,"  she  said,  pointing  to  the  one  on 
which  were  the  despatch-boxes.  "Mr.  Kerr,  bring  it  into  the 
middle  of  the  room,  please." 

Kerr  at  once  went  for  it.  Madame  Boisragon,  with  her 
handkerchief  up  to  her  mouth,  watched  him  out  of  the  cor- 
ner of  her  eyes.  She  gave  an  almost  imperceptible  start  as 
he  took  the  big  envelope  in  his  hand,  opened  the  first  des- 
patch-box, and,  letting  the  lid  drop  with  the  envelope  safe 
inside,  fumbled  for  his  keys.  But  his  keys  were  apparently 


356  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

not  in  his  pocket,  for  suddenly  he  gave  up  his  search;  and 
putting  the  despatch-boxes  on  the  floor,  he  quickly  carried  the 
table  to  the  centre  of  the  room  and  arranged  chairs  round  it. 

"Now  please  take  your  seats,"  said  Mrs.  Hopeful,  "and  I 
will  arrange  the  table." 

Silently  all  seated  themselves,  whilst  Mrs.  Hopeful  brought 
forward  and  placed  on  the  table  a  curious  collection  of 
things  she  had  brought  upstairs  with  her.  There  were  some 
sheets  of  paper;  a  little  Japanese  bell  with  a  monkey  climb- 
ing up  it ;  some  Chinese  silver  ornaments ;  a  thin  brass  plate  ; 
and  last  of  all  a  violin.  This  instrument  she  placed  so  that 
it  could  not  roll  about  unless  the  table  tipped  very  violently. 

Two  of  the  lamps  had  already  been  blown  out;  there  re- 
mained only  a  small  one  which  shed  a  soft  light,  leaving  half 
the  room  in  deep  shadow.  Near  this  lamp  Mrs.  Hopeful  now 
took  her  stand.  To  the  six  people  watching  her  expectantly, 
she  seemed  in  her  white  filmlike  dress,  with  her  fluffy  curls 
and  her  strange,  staring  eyes,  almost  like  a  wraith.  If  the 
seance  were  not  a  success  it  would  not  be  her  fault. 

"Now  for  the  last  time,  please,  listen,"  she  said.  "No- 
body is  to  move  or  speak  on  any  account,  no  matter  how  long 
we  sit.  When  the  spirits  come,  I  will  instruct  Jack  to  ask 
the  questions — nobody  else  is  to  utter  a  syllable.  There  is 
only  one  other  thing  I  have  to  say.  Whilst  you  must  first  of 
all  have  patience,  it  is  equally  necessary  that  you  make  your 
minds  blank.  Think  of  a  great  void  with  nothing  in  it  but 
space,  endless,  endless  space." 

She  had  lowered  her  voice  as  she  spoke  until  it  had  fallen 
to  a  peculiarly  soft  whisper.  Now  she  made  as  if  she  would 
turn  out  the  light.  But  suddenly  she  changed  her  mind ;  and 
with  an  exclamation,  as  if  she  had  forgotten  something,  she 
went  to  the  doors.  She  rapidly  locked  both  the  one  leading 
into  Kerr's  bedroom  and  the  hall  door,  placing  the  keys  in 
her  pocket.  Then  she  came  back  to  the  lamp  very  slowly 
and  thoughtfully. 

A  chorus  of  protests  greeted  this  unexpected  development, 
and  Madame  Boisragon  half  got  up. 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  357 

"That's  not  safe,  Mrs.  Hopeful,"  she  said  in  some  agita- 
tion. "Supposing  anything  were  to  happen  in  the  hotel — 
supposing  there  were  a  fire?" 

"Hush,"  replied  the  little  woman  softly,  "it  is  necessary,  it 
is  all  right.  Hush." 

She  seemed  almost  to  be  casting  some  spell,  for  Madame 
Boisragon  now  sank  back  in  her  chair  in  silence,  and  the 
others  raised  no  further  protests.  For  a  moment  Mrs.  Hope- 
ful studied  every  one  as  a  photographer  does  a  group;  then 
with  sudden  determination  she  blotted  out  the  light.  The 
room  was  inky-black.  Not  so  much  as  a  ray  of  light  entered 
anywhere;  it  had  been  well  arranged.  Mrs.  Hopeful  came 
to  her  seat  with  only  a  faint  swish  of  her  skirts  to  show  them 
that  she  had  moved. 

"Now,"  she  said  authoritatively,  "clasp  hands.  It  is  not 
necessary  to  hold  tight — it  is  only  necessary  to  have  the  cir- 
cle complete.  Are  you  all  holding  hands?" 

A  murmur  of  assents  greeted  the  inquiry. 

"Now,"  she  said.     .     .     . 

A  deep  silence  fell  on  the  little  party — a  silence  which  in 
the  blackness  soon  became  full  of  eloquent  suggestions.  The 
minutes,  which  at  first  dragged  because  each  mind  uncon- 
sciously clung  to  a  sense  of  time,  gradually  melted  into  noth- 
ingness and  in  place  thereof  there  was  only  unmeasured 
space.  The  breathing  of  the  seven  people  melted  into  a  com- 
mon, almost  imperceptible  suspiration;  and  with  body  and 
mind  gradually  released  from  the  ordinary  fetters,  a  mystic 
circle  was  soon  established  round  which  electric  waves  ran 
more  and  more  willingly  and  with  ever  greater  frequency. 
Animal  magnetism — an  immense  force  about  which  nothing 
valuable  is  yet  known — soon  had  hold  of  them  all ;  and  some 
hands,  more  responsive  than  others,  trembled  so  violently  that 
the  things  on  the  table  began  to  shiver  and  dance. 

"The  circle  is  complete  now,"  whispered  Mrs.  Hopeful. 
"Without  unclasping,  all  take  your  hands  ofi  the  table  and 
place  them  on  your  knees." 


358  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

There  was  a  slight  rustle  as  this  was  accomplished;  then 
the  deep  silence  came  once  more. 

Perhaps  half  an  hour  may  have  passed  before  there  was  any 
new  sign — perhaps  it  was  nearly  an  hour.  Then,  as  if  some 
unearthly  hand  had  stroked  them,  the  violin  strings  suddenly 
sounded — first  gently,  then  in  a  continuous  vibration. 
Smothered  exclamations  could  hardly  be  checked;  if  it  were 
trickery  it  was  being  done  with  marvellous  skill.  .  .  . 

"Hush,"  whispered  Mrs.  Hopeful,  "hush." 

Kerr,  who  was  on  one  side  of  her,  felt  the  perspiration  run 
down  her  fingers  so  fast  now  in  her  excitement  that  he  could 
hardly  retain  his  grasp.  Shocks  passed  into  his  fingers  like  a 
thousand  pin-pricks.  At  ohe  moment  his  hands  felt  like  ice  ; 
the  next  moment  as  if  they  were  on  fire.  And  just  then,  as  he 
was  trying  tb  analyze  his  serisations,  the  little  Japanese  hand- 
bell suddenly  tinkled  and  then  fell  over  and  began  rolling  on 
the  table  with  a  clatter  which  sent  chills  over  every  one  and 
made  Madame  Boisragon  fall  against  the  back  of  her  chair. 

"Mon  Dieu,  mon  Dieu!"  she  muttered. 

"Hush,  hush,"  came  Mrs.  Hopeful's  voice,  again  speaking 
as  if  it  were  very  far  off.  "Ah!" 

The  exclamation  she  gave  was  so  sharp  and  so  natural  that 
Mr.  Smith  spontaneously  spoke. 

"What  is  it,  my  dear?"  he  asked  gently. 

"One  of  the  sheets  of  paper  I  placed  on  the  table  under  the 
violin  has  flown  up  and  hit  me  in  the  face.  It  is  now  lying 
against  my  neck  as  if  a  wind  were  blowing  it.  It  is  time  to 
question,  Jack." 

With  an  effort  she  forced  her  voice  back  into  her  soft  whis- 
per; she  breathed  rather  than  spoke  the  last  words.  Yet  she 
was  now  trembling  so  violently  that  Kerr  became  alarmed. 

Sudden  exclamations  came  almost  simultaneously  from  the 
Spaniard  and  the  Italian  before  Mr.  Smith  could  speak. 
Lorenzo  followed  this  almost  immediately  by  scraping  back 
his  chair  and  swearing  softly  in  Italian. 

"Either  it  is  black  magic,"  he  muttered  thickly,  "or  some- 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  359 

body  is  cheating  as  cleverly  as  the  devil  himself.  Who  threw 
that?" 

There  was  a  general  murmur  of  voices,  which  Mrs.  Hope- 
ful tried  for  a  few  moments  in  vain  to  still.  Lorenzo  had 
been  hit  in  the  face  by  something.  He  protested  that  it  must 
have  been  thrown — it  was  impossible  that  it  could  have  been 
propelled  so  violently  by  mere  magnetic  agencies.  Kerr  heard 
with  growing  surprise  Lorenzo's  real  agitation ;  he  was  using 
Italian  half  the  time,  and  he  could  not  be  made  to  stop  speak- 
ing. 

"Let  us  go  on,"  said  Kerr  protestingly,  at  last.  "No  one  has 
really  seen  the  devil  yet !" 

"Silence,"  said  Mrs.  Hopeful  peremptorily,  "silence;  and 
as  soon  as  there  is  a  fresh  manifestation,  Jack,  begin  the  usual 
questions." 

But  these  interruptions  must  have  broken  the  mystic  circle; 
for  in  spite  of  the  silence  which  now  followed,  time  flowed 
by  without  any  fresh  surprise. 

They  were  beginning  to  get  restive  and  chairs  were  creaking 
— for  they  had  been  in  the  dark  for  almost  a  couple  of  hours 
now — when,  without  any  warning,  the  table  suddenly  rocked 
from  side  to  side  for  a  moment  or  two,  and  then  fell  over 
with  a  crash  on  Mrs.  Hopeful's  knees.  Kerr  pushed  it  up 
again  without  releasing  his  hands.  A  chorus  of  stifled  excla- 
mations greeted  this  development,  and  instantly  Mr.  Smith's 
voice  sounded  clear  and  calm. 

"Will  the  spirits  manifest  their  presence  by  rapping  on  the 
table?" 

Breathlessly  the  party  awaited  the  answer — and  then  sud- 
denly a  chair  was  kicked  to  the  ground  and  Lorenzo  called 
excitedly : 

"I  refuse  to  stand  it  any  longer.  Somebody  clutched  at  my 
throat — I  felt  the  fingers.  Stop,  Mrs.  Hopeful,  stop!  I 
have  got  up." 

"No,  no,"  she  cried,  "sit  down,  sit  down!" 

Several  others  began  pushing  back  their  chairs,    She  let  gp 


36o  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

of  Kerr's  hand  and  fried  in  the  dark  to  guess  how  many  had 
moved — what  had  happened. 

"Jack!"  she  cried  in  great  agitation. 

"Yes." 

"Who  has  got  up  and  who  is  still  sitting?" 

Mr.  Smith's  answer  was  drowned  in  the  exclamations  which 
followed  a  loud  bang. 

"What  was  that?"  called  De  Boyar. 

"There  is  some  one  in  the  room,  I  believe,"  replied  Loren- 
zo. "Lookout!" 

Instantly  there  was  complete  confusion.  In  their  excited 
condition  this  was  too  much  for  them.  Every  one  got  up  and 
collided  in  the  pitch  dark,  and  a  strange  panic  possessed  one 
and  all,  as  no  matches  could  be  found.  A  table  with  a  lamp 
on  it  was  overturned  with  another  great  crash — and  Kerr, 
alone  able  to  find  his  way  in  the  inky  black  by  feeling  the 
walls,  at  last  got  to  the  hall  door. 

"Where  are  you,  Mrs.  Hopeful?"  he  cried,  but  in  the  con- 
fusion of  cries  she  paid  no  attention  to  him. 

"Master,  master!"  called  the  boy's  voice  outside. 

"Yes,  all  right,"  answered  Kerr,  "look  out!" 

With  a  violent  kick  or  two,  he  splintered  a  panel  of  the 
door,  and  got  his  hand  through. 

"Matches,"  he  said  furiously,  "matches — give  me  your 
matches,  you  fool !" 

He  struck  half  a  dozen  matches  at  the  same  time  from  the 
box  passed  in  to  him,  and  in  the  great  glare  they  made  he 
beheld  a  curious  scene.  Dishevelled  and  white  with  emotion, 
yet  a  little  ashamed  of  themselves,  the  six  people  were  now 
standing  as  if  after  some  great  disaster.  Without  a  word 
Kerr  lighted  one  of  the  lamps  and  then  proceeded  to  search 
round  the  room  as  if  he  really  expected  to  find  somebody 
there.  There  was  nothing. 

"Where's  your  friend?"  he  inquired  a  little  sarcastically  of 
Lorenzo  as  he  took  the  keys  from  Mrs.  Hopeful,  who  was 
now  sitting  utterly  collapsed  in  a  chair.  Madame  Boisragon, 
though  she  too  was  agitated,  appeared  much  more  collected. 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  361 

Lorenzo  shrugged  his  shoulders.  His  calm  had  almost  re- 
turned. 

"You  may  laugh;  nevertheless,"  he  said  doggedly,  "there 
was  something."  De  Boyar  and  Mr.  Smith  proceeded  to 
question  him  closely ;  but  they  could  learn  nothing  more  than 
that  he  had  heard  somebody  in  the  far-off  corner. 

Kerr  unlocked  the  door,  only  to  find  Carnot  in  his  pyjamas 
coming  upstairs  "with  several  servants  armed  with  sticks. 
They  must  have  made  a  lot  of  noise  in  the  room. 

"What  has  happened?"  began  Carnot.  "Robbers — thieves? 
The  watchman  rushed  in  to  me  just  now." 

"I  am  sorry  you  have  been  disturbed,"  said  Kerr  apolo- 
getically as  Carnot  peered  into  the  disordered  room  with  as- 
tonishment written  on  his  features.  "We  have  been  trying 
to  talk  to  spirits!" 

"So  it  seems,"  said  the  Swiss  drily,  sniffing  the  smell  of  the 
broken  lamp  for  a  moment  or  two,  and  then  retreating  down- 
stairs again  without  another  word,  followed  by  his  wonder- 
ing domestics. 

"It  has  been  a  complete  failure,"  said  Mrs.  Hopeful  crossly 
to  Lorenzo  a  few  minutes  later,  as  the  party  broke  up  in  a 
very  unsociable  way.  Kerr  felt  that  in  every  way  it  had  been 
very  foolish,  though  for  an  hour  and  more  he  had  been  some- 
what impressed. 


CHAPTER  XXVI 

"On  peut  etre  plus  fin  qu'un  autre,  mais  non  pas 
plus  fin  que  tous  les  autres." — LA  ROCHEFOUCAULD. 

ALL  people,  whether  they  confess  to  a  superstitious  belief  in 
presentiments  or  not,  are  susceptible  at  times  to  premonitions 
of  coming  evil.  What  the  cause  of  this  may  be  no  one 
knows;  but  certain  is  it  that  Peter  Kerr,  after  spending  an 
unrestful  night,  woke  feeling  most  curiously  nervous  about 
the  future  as  well  as  openly  wrathful  that  he  had  been  actor 
in  a  grotesque  scene.  Whether  he  liked  it  or  not,  he  must 
get  up  at  once  and  prepare  for  a  momentous  interview — an 
interview  which  he  already  believed  would  be  a  complete  and 
utter  failure.  He  could  not  understand  what  possessed  him 
— but  he  would  have  given  a  great  deal  not  to  have  anything 
ahead  of  him  that  morning. 

He  had  finished  an  unsatisfactory  and  hasty  breakfast  when 
Lorenzo  joined  him.  Lorenzo  was  exactly  the  same  as  he 
always  was — a  little  silent,  a  little  cynical,  and  yet  with  the 
same  repressed  air  of  satisfaction  Kerr  had  noticed  the  pre- 
vious day.  Apparently  he  had  completely  forgotten  the  inci- 
dents of  their  spiritualistic  evening;  for  he  talked  in  snatches 
on  every  possible  subject  save  the  subject  of  Mrs.  Hopeful 
and  her  abortive  yet  tantalizing  experiments.  At  frequent 
intervals  he  consulted  his  watch,  as  if  he  were  watching  not 
only  the  minutes  but  the  seconds  as  well;  and  at  length  he 
gave  a  sigh  of  relief  when  this  bad  quarter  of  an  hour  was 
over. 

"We  must  start  in  five  minutes,"  he  said  briefly,  getting  up 
quickly  from  the  armchair  in  which  he  had  been  comfortably 
reclining.  "You  can  join  me  in  the  hall." 

Kerr  nodded  his  assent  and  went  for  his  hat  and  stick.  Then 
he  cerne  back  to  his  despatch-boxes.  He  opened  the  top  one, 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  363 

and  began  turning  over  the  envelopes  and  papers  within,  but 
by  some  strange  chance  the  fact  did  not  strike  him  at  first  that 
the  big  envelope  he  was  searching  for  was  not  where  it  should 
be.  In  spite  of  his  confessed  nervousness,  so  far  from  his 
mind  was  the  idea  that  anything  could  have  happened  to  it, 
that,  not  finding  it  in  the  first  despatch-box,  mechanically  he 
opened  the  second  one  and  began  hunting  there.  His  search 
not  being  rewarded,  he  tumbled  the  contents  of  both  boxes 
out  on  the  table  and  began  once  again  going  through  every- 
thing very  slowly  and  carefully.  As  he  came  to  the  end  of 
the  papers,  suddenly,  with  the  force  of  a  hammer-stroke,  the 
knowledge  struck  him  that  the  envelope  and  its  contents  had 
irrevocably  disappeared. 

"Good  God !"  he  muttered  to  himself,  now  fumbling  fran- 
tically with  the  papers  and  hardly  understanding  what  he  was 
doing.  The  thing  was  gone — there  was  no  trace  of  it.  That 
was  what  had  happened ! 

He  was  almost  stunned  by  the  discovery  of  his  loss.  There 
was  only  one  copy  in  Chinese — it  had  taken  days  of  work  to 
complete ;  he  had  only  now  the  English  originals — documents 
which  were  entirely  valueless  as  far  as  the  Prince  was  con- 
cerned. A  unique  opportunity  would  be  lost;  for  from 
what  Lorenzo  had  told  him,  the  Prince  contemplated  sum- 
marily impeaching  before  the  Throne  the  officials  in  whose 
hands  the  making  of  railway  contracts  had  been  placed  by 
producing  this  complete  and  superior  counter-scheme  and 
thereby  proving  that  favouritism  had  been  shown  and  the 
pockets  of  the  officials,  and  not  the  interests  of  the  country, 
consulted.  But  now 

Kerr  broke  off  hunting  and  thinking  by  ringing  furiously 
for  his  servants.  They  came  in  fear  and  trembling,  apprised 
by  the  very  violence  of  the  summons  that  something  untoward 
had  happened.  He  thundered  at  them  whilst  they  stood 
there,  only  half  understanding  what  he  said  and  yet  looking 
at  him  with  awe.  He  roundly  accused  them  with  having 
tampered  with  his  despatch-boxes,  though  in  the  midst  of  his 
rage  he  saw  that  such  a  thing  was  highly  improbable.  In  a 


364  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

fury,  he  repeated  the  same  things  again  and  again;  whilst 
they,  at  length  aroused  to  the  danger  which  threatened  them, 
protested  their  innocence  with  dramatic  gestures.  And  then, 
just  as  Kerr,  beside  himself,  was  contemplating  violence,  Lo- 
renzo, with  his  watch  in  his  hand  and  a  frown  now  on  his 
face,  suddenly  reappeared. 

"I  have  been  waiting  for  nearly  a  quarter  of  an  hour,"  he 
said,  standing  at  the  door.  "We  will  be  most  certainly 
late " 

"I  have  been  robbed,"  broke  in  Kerr  angrily.  "Those  pa- 
pers have  been  taken:  no  trace  of  them  can  be  discovered." 

"Robbed!"  exclaimed  Lorenzo  in  a  changed  voice,  advanc- 
ing quickly  into  the  middle  of  the  room.  "Robbed!" 

"Yes,  robbed,"  repeated  Kerr  hoarsely,  eyeing  his  despatch- 
boxes  wildly,  "common  or  garden  robbed!" 

The  Italian  pressed  his  lips  together,  and  looked  at  him  with 
a  strange  sternness. 

"Are  you  absolutely  sure?"  he  inquired.  "This  is  most  se- 
rious." 

Kerr  laughed  bitterly. 

"I  understand  all  it  means,  you  needn't  tell  me  that,"  he 
said.  "But  the  papers  have  disappeared- — disappeared  beyond 
a  shadow  of  doubt.  I  have  gone  through  my  despatch-boxes 
half  a  dozen  times  already.  Look!"  He  pointed  to  the  lit- 
ter he  had  made. 

Lorenzo  silently  consulted  his  watch.  He  steadily  studied 
the  dial  for  a  few  seconds  without  showing  what  was  pass- 
ing through  his  mind. 

"There  is  no  time  to  investigate,"  he  said  very  soon,  rising 
quickly  to  the  occasion.  "There  is  no  time  for  anything — 
but  one  last  search.  Look  round  the  room — look  everywhere 
quickly.  They  may  have  been  dropped.  If  the  worst  comes 
to  the  worst  we  must  take  the  English  copies  and  chance  it. 
But  there  is  no  time  to  lose." 

Kerr,  pale  with  excitement  and  with  the  perspiration  bead- 
ing his  forehead,  made  a  quick  effort  to  follow  Lorenzo's 
advice.  But  somehow  he  felt  it  was  useless  and  that  he  must 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  365 

accept  the  inevitable.  Undoubtedly  he  had  been  cleverly 
robbed.  There  was  no  trace  of  anything — the  papers  had 
disappeared  beyond  recall. 

At  length  convinced  beyond  doubt  of  this,  he  made  a  bundle 
quickly  of  the  English  duplicates  and  signified  to  Lorenzo 
that  they  had  better  go  on.  Without  another  word  they  de- 
scended the  stairs  and  went  out  on  the  street. 

With  an  abrupt  movement  Lorenzo  now  turned  to  the  in- 
terpreters. 

"Tell  the  carters,"  he  ordered  in  a  voice  they  feared,  "to 
drive  as  fast  as  they  can — to  kill  the  mules  if  necessary.  We 
must  get  to  the  Prince  on  time,  no  matter  what  happens." 

He  jumped  into  his  cart;  the  others  followed  his  example; 
and  immediately  the  carters,  goaded  by  the  orders  given  and 
the  promise  of  largesse,  thundered  along  one  behind  the  other 
at  their  quickest  speed. 

For  a  long  time  afterwards  the  memory  of  that  drive  re- 
mained with  Peter  Kerr.  The  rattle  and  thunder  of  the 
springless  cart-wheels  and  the  jarring  which  this  frantic 
progress  gave  to  his  whole  body;  the  shouts  of  his  own  par- 
ticular driver,  as  he  cleared  the  road,  and  the  insufferable 
odour  of  garlic  the  man  diffused  as  he  swung  his  body  this 
way  and  that  and  lavished  all  his  driver's  cunning  on  ex- 
tracting the  maximum  speed  possible  from  his  mule  by  blows 
and  pokes  and  savage  bit-twisting;  the  great  clouds  of  dust 
they  raised  and  left  behind,  forming  a  perfect  trail  by  which 
to  trace  their  progress — all  these  things  grew  into  Peter 
Kerr's  brain  and  became  companions  or  associates  to  the 
agonizing  thought  of  his  loss.  Rattle,  clash,  smash — why  had 
he  been  such  a  fool  as  to  forget  for  an  instant  the  caution 
which  he  had  so  long  preached  to  himself?  The  despatch- 
box  had  been  unlocked,  of  course!  Swerve,  bump,  jump — 
Lorenzo  had  been  always  right  and  he  always  wrong.  Rum- 
ble, rumble,  rumble — to  go  to  the  Prince  without  those  pa- 
pers was  like  playing  Hamlet  without  the  ghost.  There  must 
be  the  ghost  to  act  as  the  spur,  the  incentive — or  else  no  play 


366  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

was  possible !  How  could  they  possibly  explain  to  the  Prince 
that  the  papers  had  been  stolen — how  could  new  ones  be 
prepared  in  sufficient  time?  The  Prince  would  immediately 
suspect  something — possibly  he  would  believe  that  they  had 
been  approached  by  others  and  bought  so  as  not  to  interfere 
with  what  had  already  been  done.  Yes,  that  was  what  he 
would  certainly  think:  that  they  had  been  bought.  The 
Chinese  were  so  suspicious  wherever  money,  especially  the 
making  of  money,  was  concerned.  As  they  used  all  possible 
ruses  among  themselves,  they  had  no  difficulty  in  attributing 
to  others  the  same  resourcefulness,  the  same  suppleness ;  until 
an  absolute  bargain  had  been  made,  when,  of  course,  self- 
preservation  demanded  unswerving  adherence  to  the  con- 
tract so  that  credit  should  not  be  destroyed. 

Bump,  bump,  bump — perhaps  this  failure  at  a  critical  mo- 
ment would  secretly  please  the  Prince — it  would  more  or 
less  release  him  from  the  obligations  under  which  he  lay  to  his 
cheque-book.  He  would  be  able  to  say  that  as  he  had  made 
all  preparations  to  denounce  colleagues  to  the  Throne — as 
he  had  shown  himself  willing  to  jeopardize  his  own  posi- 
tion but  that  at  the  critical  moment  those  in  whose  interest 
he  was  working  had  failed  him — he  could  not  reopen  the 
question.  From  every  point  of  view  the  loss  of  the  papers  was 
more  than  unfortunate — it  was  disastrous.  Kerr  felt  that 
it  was  the  death-blow  to  his  scheme.  Owing  to  his  own  folly 
it  had  come  to  this  after  all  these  months;  and  his  bitterness 
just  then  was  so  intense  that  the  gaudy  shop-fronts  along  the 
street  suddenly  became  blurred  into  a  fantasy  of  colour 
wholly  unintelligible  to  his  brain  but  somehow  connected 
with  the  rocking  and  crashing  of  the  blue-hooded  cart  and 
the  biting  clouds  of  dust  which  choked  and  teased  him. 

It  was  with  relief  that  he  at  last  felt  his  carter  begin  to 
relax  the  frantic  pace  at  which  he  was  driving.  They  had 
at  length  swerved  into  the  narrower  street  in  which  lay  the 
Prince's  residence ;  and  prudence  and  etiquette  demanded  that 
they  should  not  gallop  past  everything  as  they  had  been  do- 


THE  HUMAN   COBWEB  367 

ing.  On  the  high  driving-road  they  might  race:  if  they  did 
that  here  and  incommoded  any  official,  his  outriders  would 
rush  down  on  them  and  beat  the  carters  with  their  heavy 
whips  without  compunction. 

The  red  chevaux-de-frises  round  the  massive  entrance  of 
the  Prince's  Palace  grew  up  beside  them  before  Kerr  had 
realized  that  they  had  arrived.  Mechanically  he  jumped  to 
the  ground  and  joined  Lorenzo,  who  was  once  again  anx- 
iously consulting  his  watch. 

"We  are  just  five  minutes  late  and  no  more,"  said  Lorenzo 
in  some  relief,  beginning  to  dust  himself  with  his  coloured 
handkerchief.  "I  have  never  travelled  faster.  And  now," 
he  continued,  facing  his  companion  in  all  seriousness,  "what 
story  are  we  to  tell?" 

"The  truth,"  replied  Kerr  shortly.  He  could  not  find  any- 
thing else  to  say. 

Lorenzo  shrugged  his  shoulders. 

"The  truth,"  he  said,  "can  be  used  at  times — sparingly. 
The  question  is,  will  it  help  us  now?" 

Without  deciding  the  matter  they  went  in.  They  noted  that 
a  great  official  sedan-chair  was  waiting  in  the  courtyard  and 
that  a  dozen  outriders  stood  by  their  horses  round  it.  It  was 
quite  true  then — the  Prince  was  just  waiting  for  them  and 
would  go  out  the  instant  their  business  was  completed. 

They  found  him  standing  fully  dressed  in  his  official  clothes 
— his  bell-shaped  hat  and  his  beautiful  long-coat,  his  simple 
girdle,  his  strange  cloth  top-boots,  all  complete.  On  this  mo- 
mentous occasion  he  wasted  little  time  on  ceremony;  he  mo- 
tioned his  visitors  rapidly  to  seats  and  dismissed  his  attend- 
ants. 

"These  gentlemen  have  brought  all  the  necessary  papers?" 
he  said  to  the  interpreters.  The  interpreters  repeated  the 
question.  Kerr  mastered  himself  with  an  effort. 

"Tell  the  Prince,"  he  said  very  gravely,  "that  a  most  dis- 
astrous thing  has  occurred.  After  much  labour,  I  had  all 
the  documents  prepared  in  Chinese,  as  was  duly  arranged. 
They  were  placed  in  a  tin  despatch-box.  During  the  last 


368  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

twelve  hours  the  despatch-box  has  been  broken  into  and  these 
documents  have  disappeared.  We  have  had  no  time  to  in- 
vestigate— we  only  know  that  the  documents  have  disap- 
peared. I  am  grieved  beyond  measure:  all  I  can  now  offer 
to  the  Prince  are  the  English  originals." 

The  interpreters — themselves  overcome  with  surprise,  for 
they  had  heard  nothing  until  now — translated  word  for  word 
what  Kerr  said.  The  expression  on  the  Prince's  face  changed 
in  the  most  surprising  manner  when  he  had  heard  all  they 
had  to  say.  He  fingered  his  girdle  in  great  embarrassment, 
and  his  lips  moved  quickly  as  he  muttered  to  himself. 

"This  is  all  very  well,"  he  said  at  length,  "but  without 
those  documents  I  can  do  nothing.  In  a  foreign  language 
they  are  as  useless  to  me  as  if  they  did  not  exist.  I  am  sorry 
about  the  loss,  but  I  can  do  nothing  to  help  matters." 

He  concluded  almost  angrily — certainly  petulantly — and 
Kerr  became  convinced  that  the  forecast  he  had  made  to  him- 
self was  correct.  The  Prince  would  throw  the  entire  blame 
on  them  and  disclaim  all  responsibility  in  the  future. 

"In  three  days  I  will  have  new  copies  ready,"  said  Kerr. 
"I  will  send  them  at  once." 

"It  is  useless,"  said  the  Prince,  cutting  short  the  interpret- 
ers as  they  spoke.  "It  is  a  question  of  either  to-day  or  never. 
To-morrow  at  daybreak  the  rival  proposals  will  be  examined 
by  the  State  Council,  and  if  there  is  no  good  ground  for  re- 
jecting them  they  will  be  sanctioned." 

He  rose  to  his  feet  to  signify  that  the  interview  was  at  an 
end — he  himself  had  to  go  to  the  Palace  at  once,  he  intimated. 

The  adieus  on  both  sides  were  curt  and  formal.  Through 
the  entire  interview  Lorenzo  had  sat  rigidly  silent — his  face 
might  have  been  made  of  marble  had  it  not  been  that  his 
eyes  were  alive  with  a  fierce  resolve. 

They  came  back  quickly  to  the  hotel — wasting  not  a  minute 
in  the  expression  of  vain  regrets,  nor  indeed  speaking  one 
word.  Upstairs  they  went  in  the  same  silence,  and  not  un- 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  369 

til  the  door  had  been  shut  and  he  had  thrown  himself  into  a 
chair,  did  Kerr  show  his  real  feelings. 

"Curse  it,"  he  said  thickly,  "curse  it!  If  I  could  only  un- 
derstand how  this  happened,  this  would  be  a  day  of  reck- 
oning." 

The  blood  rushed  to  his  face  in  such  a  flood  of  rage  that  his 
features  became  bloated  and  distorted. 

Lorenzo,  standing  with  his  back  turned,  and  apparently 
gazing  out  of  the  windows  at  the  vast  coloured  pile  of  the 
distant  Ch'ien  Men  Tower,  which  stood  out  so  grimly 
against  the  horizon,  now  turned  suddenly.  There  was  some- 
thing in  his  new  attitude  curiously  suggestive  of  the  panther 
about  to  spring.  Yet  there  was  also  a  certain  satisfaction 
hard  to  explain.  His  keen  eyes  noted  the  Englishman's  con- 
dition in  a  single  quick  glance.  The  moment  had  arrived. 
He  moistened  his  lips  in  a  peculiar  mannerism  of  his. 

"If  you  would  discover  the  author  of  a  crime,"  he  said 
slowly,  "consider  who  had  an  interest  to  commit  it." 

Kerr,  deep  in  his  gloomy  and  revengeful  thoughts,  looked 
up  at  Lorenzo,  hardly  understanding  what  he  said.  Then  a 
new  light  broke  on  him,  and  with  an  exclamation  he  started 
forward. 

"I  know  what  you  believe "  he  began  fiercely. 

Lorenzo  stopped  him  with  an  imperative  gesture.  There 
was  something  almost  noble  in  the  way  in  which  he  refused 
to  be  a  party  to  any  detailed  discussion. 

"If  you  would  discover  the  author  of  a  crime,"  he  repeated 
a  second  time,  moving  slowly  towards  the  door,  "consider 
who  had  an  interest  to  commit  it.  It  is  no  business  of  mine." 

Then,  without  another  word,  he  quietly  withdrew. 

"He  has  left  me  to  solve  the  problem  alone,"  muttered  Kerr 
to  himself.  He  wondered  a  little  why  he  spoke  aloud  to 
himself.  "He  has  gone,"  he  said  dully,  speaking  for  the 
second  time.  He  took  two  or  three  steps  and  then  stopped 
suddenly.  "It  can  only  be  that,"  he  said,  convincing  himself 


370  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

by  the  sound  of  his  voice.  There  was  something  fearful  in 
the  idea  that  a  woman  who  had  lain  in  his  arms  should 
have  robbed  him:  it  was  as  if  somebody  had  treacherously 
stabbed  him  from  behind  when  all  his  attention  had  been 
concentrated  on  the  enemy  in  front.  How  and  when  had 
she  done  it — and  why,  oh,  why?  .  .  . 

A  new  anguish — the  anguish  of  a  man  tricked  by  a  woman 
— mixing  with  his  sullen  anger,  filled  him  with  such  an 
ecstasy  of  emotion  that  he  found  himself  pacing  round  and 
round  his  sitting-room  without  knowing  what  he  was  doing. 

"You  fool — you  fool!"  he  said  violently,  stopping  and 
looking  at  his  reflection  in  a  mirror  over  the  mantelpiece. 
His  face  looked  back  at  him  so  sternly  and  so  bitterly  that 
an  immense  self-pity  welled  up  within  him.  He  was  not  to 
be  blamed  so  much,  after  all — even  a  Solomon  could  be 
tricked.  He  had  let  things  take  their  course,  when  he 
should  have 

He  stood  contemplating  himself  with  eyes  which  now  only 
half  saw;  for  a  new  idea  had  become  born  in  his  mind  and 
was  rapidly  overwhelming  everything  else.  The  old  Mosaic 
law  was,  after  all,  the  only  satisfying  thing — an  eye  for 
an  eye,  a  tooth  for  a  tooth.  Without  another  word,  fully 
determined  on  his  line  of  action,  he  walked  rapidly  but 
carefully  to  the  verandah  and  then  towards  Madame  Bois- 
r agon's  rooms. 

The  Japanese  screen  which  shut  off  half  the  verandah 
had  been  laid  aside  by  some  careless  servant,  and  thus  the 
last  excuse  for  him  to  pause  was  removed.  He  walked  to 
the  first  window  and  called. 

"May  I  come  in?"  he  asked  in  a  voice  which  was  now 
singularly  composed. 

The  silence  which  followed  his  question  was  more  eloquent 
to  him  than  a  hundred  answers ;  without  a  trace  of  hesitation 
he  now  invaded  the  privacy  of  her  rooms. 

"Lorenzo  is  right  again,"  he  remarked  gloomily  to  himself. 
Madame  Boisragon  had  gathered  her  few  curios  together, 
and  an  empty  box  on  the  ground  showed  where  they  would 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  371 

soon  be  placed.  He  had  often  wondered  whether  she  was 
mean  because  she  spent  so  little  money.  Anyway,  she 
would  leave  nothing  behind:  every  trumpery  thing  would 
go.  ...  In  her  bedroom  all  was  already  packed.  Kerr 
contemplated  these  signs  with  steady  eyes:  everything  was 
as  he  now  expected. 

A  torn  paper  lying  on  the  floor  suddenly  caught  his 
attention.  He  stooped  and  picked  it  up;  and  holding  the 
broken  pieces  together,  saw  that  it  was  the  draft  of  a  tele- 
gram she  had  evidently  despatched  that  morning.  She 
announced  that  she  was  leaving  at  once.  Well,  he  could 
see  about  that  for  himself. 

For  a  moment  the  fear  filled  his  heart  that  she  would  not 
return.  Then  a  glance  around  her  rooms  reassured  him, 
and  with  settled  determination  he  slowly  returned  to  his 
own  rooms. 

There  was  ample  time,  he  found,  for  his  hot  anger  to  cool 
and  give  place  to  a  sterner  resolve.  Well,  he  would  see  it 
through  coolly.  He  opened  his  door  leading  onto  the  landing, 
so  that  no  one  could  pass  along  without  being  seen,  and 
seating  himself  he  prepared  to  remain  at  his  post  indefinitely. 
He  had  one  object  in  view,  and  he  would  pursue  it  relent- 
lessly. 

The  tiffin-hour  passed  unnoticed  by  him — he  soon  lost  his 
sense  of  time — and  it  was  only  the  lengthening  shadows 
forming  fantastic  shapes  across  the  floor  of  his  room  which 
told  him  that  the  day  was  rapidly  waning.  Only  once 
did  he  get  up — to  replenish  his  stock  of  cigarettes — and 
during  these  waiting  hours  he  had  ample  time  to  drink  the 
cup  of  his  bitterness  to  the  dregs.  His  wondering  servants, 
coming  cautiously  upstairs  and  seeing  him  sitting  there  in 
gloomy  silence,  noiselessly  disappeared,  driven  away  by  the 
fear  of  fresh  explosions  of  wrath.  Everybody  was  leaving 
him  to  work  out  the  problem  himself,  he  thought.  Well, 
let  them  wait  and  see 

At  last  his  patience  was  rewarded.     For  the  hundredth 


372  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

time,  hearing  footsteps  on  the  staircase,  he  got  up  and  went 
to  the  door.  This  time  he  was  sure  it  was  not  in  vain.  That 
quick,  light  tread  was  unmistakable — she  was  at  length  com- 
ing back,  at  the  hour  he  was  generally  out.  He  steadied 
himself  for  a  moment,  and  then,  timing  it  carefully,  went 
rapidly  out  and  met  Madame  Boisragon  just  as  she  mounted 
the  last  stairs. 

He  waved  her  gasp  of  surprise  away  with  a  stern  movement 
of  his  hands.  Her  eyes  had  sought  his  face  with  quick 
apprehension;  and  with  a  woman's  matchless  intuition  her 
brain  had  leaped  at  once  to  a  complete  understanding  of 
what  was  coming. 

"I  wish  to  speak  with  you,"  he  said,  forcing  himself  to  an 
unnatural  calm.  "Come."  He  put  out  a  hand. 

She  drew  herself  away  from  him  with  a  gesture  of  disdain — 
as  if  she  rejected  once  and  for  all  the  intimacy  his  manner 
implied.  In  such  a  supreme  moment  it  was  perhaps  her  only 
course. 

"Who  are  you,"  she  said  quickly,  "to  order  me  like  that? 
What  is  the  matter  with  you — what  do  you  mean?" 

"Come,"  he  replied,  holding  to  his  point  and  seizing  her 
arm  in  his  powerful  grip.  "I  wish  to  speak  with  you."  He 
remembered  afterwards  that  the  weakness  of  her  arm  gave 
him  an  unholy  desire  to  be  brutal. 

"Speak  here,  then,"  she  said  in  a  frantic  attempt  to  main- 
tain her  calm,  as  the  man's  twitching  hand  informed  her  of 
the  boiling  volcano  within  him.  But  she  could  not  release 
herself.  "Speak — what  is  the  matter  with  you?" 

"The  matter  is — the  matter  is — God!"  He  broke  off  sud- 
denly and  with  a  brutal  jerk  forced  her  forward  to  his 
door. 

"Unless  you  let  go,"  she  said  breathlessly  as  horror  gained 
her,  "I  will  shriek,  and  the  whole  hotel  will  know." 

"Shriek,"  he  adjured  her  coldly,  standing  still  and  giving 
her  time  to  do  so.  "Shriek,  and  I  will  tell  all  those  who 
come  what  it  is  I  have  to  say  to  you." 

"The  man  is  mad,"  she  moaned  to  herself,  her  self-pos- 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  373 

session  breaking  down  as  he  forced  through  his  door.  He 
shut  the  door  with  a  steady  hand  and  searched  for  the 
key.  The  key  was  for  some  reason  missing — he  vaguely 
remembered  something  about  the  night  before,  and  won- 
dered whether  it  was  that  which  had  caused  it  to  disappear. 
With  a  smothered  oath,  he  accepted  the  fact,  and  turned 
towards  her. 

"Now,"  he  said,  releasing  his  hold,  "I  want  you  to  confess 
that  you  are  a  common  thief  and  have  robbed  me.  Confess," 
he  said. 

Madame  Boisragon's  frightened  eyes  roved  quickly  over 
the  room:  there  was  no  possible  escape. 

"You  are  mad,"  she  sobbed,  sinking  into  a  chair.  "You 
have  already  bruised  my  arm  black  and  blue.  You  are  a 
brute — a  brute!" 

"I  would  like  you  to  understand,"  said  Peter  Kerr,  com- 
ing a  step  nearer,  "that  you  will  have  to  confess  or  take  the 
consequences." 

Madame  Boisragon  sat  up  suddenly. 

"The  consequences?"  she  exclaimed  blankly.  "The  con- 
sequences?" 

"Yes,"  answered  Kerr  grimly,  "the  consequences." 

For  a  moment  the  two  eyed  each  other  fixedly,  and  then 
once  more  the  woman's  self-possession  broke  down.  There 
had  come  on  to  Peter  Kerr's  face  a  look  of  ferocity,  of 
sheer  animalism,  which  almost  struck  her  to  the  ground. 

She  let  her  arms  drop  weakly  beside  her,  for  terror  now 
completely  unnerved  her. 

"You  who  have  loved,"  she  moaned,  "you  who  have 
smothered  me  in  kisses — you  who  have  lain  on  my 
bosom " 

"Stop,"  he  cried  hoarsely,  "stop,  or  I  will  make  you  stop 
by  force.  What  have  I  ever  done  that  you  should  ruin  me 
when  success  was  within  my  grasp?  I  am  now  sure  that  it 
was  you  who  robbed  me — you  who  took  my  papers — and  I 
will  force  you  to  confess.  Lorenzo  often  warned  me  in 
so  many  words  about  you,  but  he  was  an  Italian  and  I  did 


374  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

not  believe  him,   for  the  thing  was  grotesque.     And  now 
the  grotesque  thing  has  come  true!" 

She  raised  her  tear-stained  face. 

"Peter,"  she  pleaded,  "you  have  made  me  weak  and 
broken.  Let  me  go  and  I  will  tell  you  everything  after- 
wards." 

"You  shall  not  go,"  he  said,  shaking  with  rage  at  the 
weak  obstinacy  which  opposed  him.  "Confess  what  you  have 
done — I  tell  you  to  confess." 

He  caught  hold  of  her  arm  again  and  dragged  her  to  her 
feet.  She  tried  to  break  free  but  her  efforts  were  unavailing. 

"Coward!"  she  cried  in  a  fresh  paroxysm  of  fear.  "Cow- 
ard, coward,  coward!" 

"Confess,"  he  said  dully,  "for  the  last  time  I  say — confess." 

He  dragged  her  across  the  room,  and  reaching  up  to  a  rack, 
took  down  his  riding-whip.  With  a  smothered  shriek  she 
flung  herself  against  his  chest  and  tried  to  reach  his  face 
with  her  frozen  lips. 

"Great  God,"  he  exclaimed  fiercely,  "I  will  not  relent.  I 
will  not — not  for  heaven  or  hell.  I  will  flog  you  as  you 
deserve.  Now  see " 

With  a  violent  effort  he  tore  his  arm  free  and  forced  her 
to  the  ground.  The  sweat  poured  down  his  face  as  he 
swung  up  his  whip — and  then  .  . 

The  door  had  opened  so  quietly  that  it  took  several  sec- 
onds for  the  furious  man  to  understand  what  his  eyes  saw. 
It  was  a  little  miraculous  and  very  strange.  For  framed  in 
the  doorway,  freshly  dressed  in  a  new  check  suit,  with  a 
gay  flower  in  his  buttonhole,  stood  Lorenzo,  imperturbable 
and  yet  slightly  smiling.  Slowly  Peter  Kerr's  mind  ab- 
sorbed the  fact  that  Lorenzo  had  come  back — that  this  was 
Lorenzo.  He  faltered  in  his  contemplated  action — and  then, 
as  if  his  arm  refused  its  service,  it  fell  to  his  side. 

Lorenzo  advanced  quietly  into  the  room  and  closed  the, 
door, 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  375 

"I  am  afraid,"  he  said  very  deliberately,  taking  off  his  hat 
to  show  that  he  intended  to  stay,  "I  am  afraid  that  I  am 
interrupting  an  interview  of  importance."  He  took  a  few 
more  steps.  "Yet,"  he  added,  producing  a  silk  handkerchief 
from  his  pocket  and  wiping  his  forehead,  "I  am  prompted  to 
do  so  by  the  knowledge  that  in  all  disagreeable  affairs  it  is 
always  best  to  have  a  witness." 

Having  said  which,  he  watched  with  extraordinary 
phlegm  the  two  as  they  disengaged  themselves.  Madame 
Boisragon  dropped  half  fainting  into  an  armchair:  Kerr 
flung  the  whip  hard  on  the  ground  and  continued  to  look 
at  him  with  unmeaning  eyes.  The  man  was  very  far  gone, 
and  the  Italian  saw  and  understood. 

"My  dear  fellow,"  said  Lorenzo,  picking  his  words  care- 
fully, "it  is  possible  by  over-excitement  to  invite  a  veritable 
disaster  in  this  hot,  dry  climate." 

He  advanced  to  the  table  and  poured  out  a  whisky  and 
water. 

"Drink,"  he  said  shortly,  "drink  and  collect  yourself,  for 
we  have  a  good  deal  to  attend  to." 

Kerr  took  the  glass  which  was  offered  him  mechanically  in 
his  hands  and  as  mechanically  emptied  it.  The  veins  in 
his  forehead  slowly  relaxed  their  ugly  look,  and  soon  the 
blood  flowed  more  peacefully. 

"Now  that  matters  are  more  calm,"  said  Lorenzo,  "let  us 
attend  to  the  lady." 

He  refilled  the  glass. 

"Madame,"  he  said  coldly,  coming  forward  and  bending 
over  her,  "I  counsel  you  to  drink  this:  it  will  restore  you 
somewhat." 

He  raised  her  head  and  put  the  glass  to  her  lips.  After  a 
moment  she  drank  greedily;  but  no  sooner  had  she  emptied 
the  glass  than  she  fell  back  in  her  old  attitude.  She  lay 
there  as  if  she  were  not  a  living  woman,  but  an  inanimate 
object — a  corpse — killed  by  Kerr's  boiling  passion. 

"It  is  best  to  leave  her,"  said  Lorenzo  indifferently.     "She 


376  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

will  require  some  time  to  recover.  You  must  remember,  my 
dear  fellow,  that  women  are  more  highly  strung  than  men. 
Now  let  me  see <" 

He  sought  for  a  moment  in  his  pocket,  and  then  very 
deliberately  produced  the  missing  door-key  and  laid  it  care- 
fully on  the  table.  Kerr  made  no  comment. 

"Now  that  we  can  speak  plainly — after  an  interval  of 
some  weeks,"  continued  Lorenzo,  "I  propose  to  make  a 
number  of  remarks — -in  fact>  to  clear  up  things  generally. 
First  let  me  ask  you  for  your  congratulations." 

Kerr  looked  at  him  blankly.  He  was  rapidly  recovering  his 
calm. 

"What  do  you  mean  ?"  said  he;  l 

Lorenzo  laughed  his  clear,  rich  laugh,  and  then  quickly 
stopped. 

"I  may  permit  myself  a  little  gaiety,"  he  said  apologetically, 
"for  the  reason  that  my  troubles  are  over.  My  Imperial 
Edict  has  at  last  materialized." 

"What !"  exclaimed  Kerr,  the  colour  leaping  into  his 
cheeks.  "Your  concession  has  gone  through— is  authorized?" 

"Absolutely  and  unmistakably,"  replied  Lorenzo  very 
calmly.  "The  news  has  been  home  long  enough  for  congrat- 
ulations to  come  back  to  me,  you  see." 

He  took  from  his  pocket  a  sheath  of  telegrams.  "People 
are  simply  delighted,"  he  said. 

Kerr  began  pacing  up  and  down  the  room :  it  was  a  day 
of  surprises. 

"Then  you  knew  this " 

"Yesterday,"  answered  Lorenzo;  "but  I  thought  it  best 
not  to  make  any  confusion  about  it  until  this  morning's 
business  had  been  attended  to.  Now,  I  dare  say  in  view  of 
our  mutual  arrangement  it  may  be  of  some  comfort  to  you." 

"Of  some  comfort!"  exclaimed  Kerr.  "There  is  a  for- 
tune in  the  underwriting- — — " 

"The  Founders'  shares  will  be  very  pleasant  counters  to 
play  with,"  remarked  Lorenzo,  searching  for  his  cigar- 
case.  "We  will  mark  them  one  shilling,  and  they  will  go 


THE;  HUMAN   COBWEB 

>  a  <couple -of  hundred  apiece,  or  else  I  know  nothing  about 
gambling.  You  had  better  wire  to  your  peoples  without 
delay." 

"Qf  course,"  said  Kerr.  "I  cannot  tell  you  how  pleased  I 
am  that  you  should  have  got  what  you  deserved." 

"My  dear  fellow,"  said  Lorenzo  protestingly,  putting  out 
a  hand.  He  struck  a  match,  and  with  the  first  puff  of 
cigar-smoke  his  expression  changed. 

"We  are  forgetting  things.  Let  us  come  back  to  the  local 
situation,"  he  said  cuttingly,  looking  at  Madame  Boisragon. 
She  was  still  lying  utterly  crushed  in  the  same  attitude  ; 
but  he  could  see  that  now  she  was  able  to  hear  and  under- 
stand all  that  was  said. 

Kerr  involuntarily  clenched  his  fist  and  frowned :  Lorenzo, 
observing  the  change  in  him,  shrugged  his  shoulders. 

"It  is  a  pity,"  he  said,  "that  in  the  first  place  we  did  not 
pay  more  attention. to  the  amiable  clientele  of  this  hotel. 
Had  we  done  so  very  searchingly  we  would  have  discovered 
that"— he  turned  his  head  towards  Madame  Boisragon- — 
"room  No.  6  contained  a  very  amiable  young  man  who 
merits  a  good  thrashing.  This  young  person,  it  appears 
from  what  Carnot  tells  me,  has  been  observing  us  very 
closely.  He  has  not  hesitated  to  listen  to  our  conversations 
and  has  doubtlessly  faithfully  reported  them  to  the  estimable 
Boisragon  his  employer.'/ 

Lorenzo  stopped  a  few  seconds  to  puff  at  his  cigar.  '  He 
shot  a  glance  first  at  Madame  Boisragon  and  then  at  Kerr. 
Kerr  was  listening  to  him  in  open  surprise. 

"I  am  not  a  detective,"  continued  Lorenzo,  "so  I  am  unable 
to  tell  you  how  a  number  of  things  occurred — >for  instance, 
what  instructions  Mr.  No.  6  actually  possessed  and  all  he 
may  have  done.  But  I  can  tell  you  one  thing  to-day — -that 
our  papers  would  have  probably  disappeared  in  the  night  had 
they  not  been  taken  by. this  lady  during  '•  Mrs.  Hopeful's 
seance  I;!  <"  fo-; 

"What !"  cried  Kerr,  interrupting  him.  "Do  you  mean 
tQ  MQhor-it&ii 


378  THE    HUMAN   COBWEB 

Lorenzo  cut  him  short  by  rising  to  his  feet  with  surprising 
agility.  He  was  just  in  the  nick  of  time,  for  Madame  Bois- 
ragon  had  quietly  got  up  and  was  nearly  on  the  verandah. 

"Madame,"  said  Lorenzo,  this  time  in  French,  "it  would 
be  wisest  for  you  to  keep  your  seat." 

"Come  back,"  added  Kerr  warningly.  White  and  speech- 
less from  rage  and  mortification,  she  sat  down  again.  Lo- 
renzo took  the  precaution  of  shutting  the  windows,  and 
then  resumed. 

"I  told  you  a  rather  surprising  but  true  thing,"  he  said. 
"You  will  remember  how  nervous  I  was  about  last  evening; 
you  will  Temember  how  curiously  I  acted ;  and  you  will 
also  remember  that  at  the  end  I  said  there  was  some  one 
else  in  the  room  in  the  dark." 

"Yes,"  said  Kerr  breathlessly,  "I  remember." 

Lorenzo  chuckled. 

"Well,"  he  said  drily,  "I  was  mistaken.  There  was  no  one 
but  ourselves — only  some  of  us  had  moved  rather  quietly." 

He  stopped  speaking,  and  taking  his  cigar  between  his 
teeth,  used  both  his  hands  to  draw  out  his  heavy  pocketbook. 

"Do  you  know  anything  about  dress  materials?"  he 
inquired  of  Kerr.  "If  you  do,  you  should  recognize  this." 

He  produced  a  little  piece  of  black  material  with  a  hole 
through  it. 

"When  the  lid  of  your  despatch-box"  (Kerr  started  in 
fresh  surprise)  "slipped  down  with  a  crash  last  night  owing 
to  the  lady's  agitation,  her  dress  caught.  This  morning  as 
you  were  making  your  last  search  for  the  papers  I  picked 
this  up  on  the  floor  just  under  the  despatch-boxes.  The 
problem  is  now  fully  solved." 

"But  the  papers,"  said  Kerr,  struggling  with  the  mixed 
feelings  which  overwhelmed  him,  "let  us  recover  the  papers 
at  least." 

"The  papers,  I  fancy,"  he  said  with  a  cynical  smile,  "are 
probably  being  carried  as  fast  as  they  can  travel  by  Mr.  No. 
6,  who,  Carnot  informs  me,  left  Peking  at  eight  o'clock  in 
the  morning.  And  now,"  he  concluded,  "unless  you  wish 


THE  HUMAN  COBWEB  379 

to  talk  further  with  her,  I  propose  that  this  lady  be  allowed 
to  go  too,  as  I  have  some  business  to  transact  with  you. 
Madame,  there  is  the  door." 

He  rose  to  his  feet  and  placed  himself  beside  Kerr. 

Slowly  and  haltingly  Madame  Boisragon  left  the  room. 


c??£          aawaoo  VTAMUH  SHT 

b^v/oiin  'JO  '(hfil  ftifh  1/nlt  ^oqoiq  I  tw{  ifjiv/  lorftty}.  ilr.J  ot 
,m>7   lijiv/  rjjisniriJ   01   wm'iwd  .yrno?  ovr-d   I   eit   ,005  034  OT 


,mooi  alb  5b! 


^biaod  V'muid  Jronln  J..HK  jo-ji  2iH  o?  s?oi  »H 

CHAPTER  XXVIIhkr!  l 


"On  aime  a  deviner  les  autres,  mais  on  n'airae 
pas  a  etre  de vine."— LA  ROCHEFOUCAULD. 

IN  London,  shortly  after  these  events,  Sir  James  Barker, 
seated  opposite  Mr.  Elihu  Jerkins,  was  very  much  occupied 
in  gazing  reflectively  out  of  his  office  windows.  He  seemed 
to  be  studying  the  grimy  walls  of  the  buildings  across  the 
street  with  an  amount  of  absorption  hardly  justified  by 
their  commonplace  appearance.  Also,  as  he  had  looked  at 
them  for  nigh  on  forty  years,  he  could  scarcely  hope  to  find 
to-day  anything  new  in  their  aspect.  It  was  so  plain  from  his 
attitude  that  he  had  no  desire  to  discuss  matters  further, 
that  Mr.  Elihu  Jerkins,  after  he  had  allowed  a  certain 
interval  to  elapse,  made  the  next  remarks.  And  what  Mr. 
Elihu  Jerkins  said  was  peculiarly  characteristic  of  the  man. 

"It's  damned  funny,"  he  commented  slowly,  shifting  his 
feet  about  and  studying  the  big  banker's  profile,  "that  is, 
if  you  look  at  it  in  the  right  way.  We  were  both  playing 
safety  on  our  own  stamping-grounds — you  in  London  and 
I  in  New  York — and,  by  gum,  it  appears  to  me  the  game 
just  comes  to  that  and  nothing  else,  which  is  a  good  sell 
for  both  of  us." 

Sir  James  Barker  did  not  answer  at  once  this  somewhat 
involved  and  cryptic  speech.  The  buildings  on  the  other  side 
of  the  street  seemed  to  have  now  acquired  an  overpowering 
attraction  for  him.  He  stared  at  them  very  steadily,  for  he 
did  not  want  to  make  any  mistakes. 

The  news  had  just  been  fully  confirmed  that  a  Brussels 
syndicate  had  definitely  completed  a  contract  with  the 
Chinese  government  for  building  one  half  of  the  grand- 
trunk  line  which  was  the  vitals  of  Kerr's  great  scheme. 
Practically  this  rendered  impossible  the  carrying  out  of  his. 


THE  HUMAN   COBWEB  381 

comprehensive  idea.  For  in  addition  to  what  had  been  done 
by  this  particular  syndicate,  an  American  group,  strongly 
suspected  of  being  only  a  catjs-paw  of  very  high  and  mighty 
personages,  had  virtually  concluded  a  similar  contract  for 
another  portion  of  the  grand-trunk  line.  Allowing  for  the 
feeder-lines  which  would  be  subsequently  acquired  by  these 
two  groups,  several  thousand  miles  of  railway  had  thus  been 
irrevocably  earmarked  by  others.  There  were  also  strong 
rumours  in  London  that  the  Oriental  Corporation  had  at 
last  succeeded  in  inducing  the  government  to  give  them  open 
support,  in  preference  to  all  other  British  finance  houses,  in 
order  to  offset  the  political  effects  of  this  great  rival  railway 
activity  in  China.  Thus  on  all  sides  powerful  combinations 
had  arisen  making  the  outlook  quite  hopeless  for  Kerr. 

"There  is  certainly  a  lot  of  news,''  said  Sir  James  Barker 
at  last,  "and  I  think  we  ought  to  be  glad  that  we  played 
safety,  as  you  call  it.  It  means,  in  any  case,  that  we  shall 
get  our  money  back." 

"Damn  the  dollars,"  growled  Jerkins  discontentedly  and 
slangily,  "if  there's  going  to  be  no  swag." 

Sir  James  Barker  permitted  himself  to  smile  as  he  at  last 
swung  his  chair  back  to  his  desk. 

"Let's  look  into  figures,"  he  said,  "before  we  become  too 
pessimistic.  Of  course  we  pool  all  these  private  options?" 

Mr.  Jerkins  nodded  and  then  smiled  rather  queerly.  Eng- 
land's bad  climate  always  put  him  out  of  sorts.  He  contem- 
plated the  other  man  working  for  a  while,  and  then 

"Say,  Barker,"  he  began,  "I  don't  want  to  appear  inquisi- 
tive, but  just  when  did  it  happen  that  you  cut  into  the 
Brussels  deal?" 

Barker  looked  up  from  the  sheet  of  paper  on  which  he  was 
making  rough  calculations,  and  suddenly  betrayed  a  certain 
embarrassment  in  his  manner. 

"Well,"  he  confessed  guardedly,  "it  was  some  time  ago." 

Mr.  Jerkins  slapped  his  leg  and  laughed  uproariously; 

"I  guessed  as  much  a  month  or  two  back  myself,  and  that's 
why  I  went  in  so  strong  with  our  own  New  York  people." 


382  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

"Oh,"  said  Sir  James  Barker,  a  little  curtly.  He  went  on 
calculating  and  had  soon  finished. 

"Our  options  in  these  two  other  syndicates  are  worth  at 
least  eighty  thousand,"  he  said,  "and  Kerr  has  really  spent 
very  little  money.  Including  the  survey-parties  and  other 
expenses,  the  last  total  I  have  is  only  .£29,000.  Even  if  we 
decide  to  let  him  stay  for  a  few  months  longer  to  see  what 
he  can  do,  the  amount  will  not  be  anything  like  the  value  of 
our  options.  So  our  money  will  come  back — apart  from 
what  he  may  do  on  his  own  account.  And,"  concluded  Sir 
James  Barker,  "I  have  a  little  surprise  for  you." 

"What's  that?"  said  Jerkins,  sitting  up  sharply. 

The  big  banker  laughed  at  his  change  of  attitude. 

"It  was  rather  clever  of  Kerr,"  he  remarked,  "but  we  have 
got  an  option  on  100,000  shares  in  this  new  Chinese  Mining 
Syndicate." 

"What!"  exclaimed  Jerkins,  pulling  some  newspapers 
towards  him  and  rapidly  turning  over  the  pages  until  he 
found  what  he  sought.  "This  thing,  you  mean — the  Great 
Northern  Syndicate?" 

"Yes,  that  thing,"  replied  Sir  James  Barker  with  peculiar 
satisfaction. 

"Good  business,"  said  Jerkins,  rubbing  his  hands,  "good 
man,  that  fellow  Kerr.  How  did  he  manage  it?" 

Sir  James  Barker  explained  that  he  had  been  able  to  assist 
in  certain  matters  in  Peking,  and  as  a  result  this  option  had 
been  secured. 

"Well,  things  aren't  so  bad  after  all,"  said  Mr.  Elihu 
Jerkins  at  length.  "There  will  be  some  swag." 

"We  can  only  hope  that  the  public  will  bite,"  said  Sir 
James  Barker  cautiously.  "Far  Eastern  politics  are  so 
treacherous  that  it  is  impossible  to  know  what  will  or  will 
not  happen." 

Jerkins  laughed  quite  cheerily  now. 

"I  believe,  Barker,"  he  said,  "if  you  had  this  whole  bank 
full  of  gold,  you  would  only  admit  that  the  outlook  was  not 
entirely  unpromising.  You  never  bounce  a  bit." 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  383 

Sir  James  Barker  smiled. 

"Perhaps  it  is  our  delicious  climate,"  he  suggested,  looking 
at  the  rain  which  was  now  splashing  against  the  windows. 
He  was  glad  Jerkins  was  in  good  humour  again,  as  he 
needed  his  co-operation  very  soon  in  another  scheme.  "Now 
how  about  Kerr:  shall  we  authorize  him  to  act  at  his  dis- 
cretion— that  is,  to  stay  on  if  he  thinks  it  worth  while? 
He  seems  to  want  to — from  what  he  telegraphs." 

"By  all  means,  by  all  means,"  said  Mr.  Elihu  Jerkins. 
"He  may  pull  something  out  of  the  wreckage  yet,  and  that 
will  mean  a  little  more  on  the  right  side  of  the  account. 
Besides,  it  is  rather  rough  on  him,  the  way  we  were  hedging 
all  the  time."  And  with  that,  the  "conference,"  as  Mr. 
Elihu  Jerkins  called  this  two-man  talk,  abruptly  ended. 

Sir  James  Barker  had  occasion — he  put  it  that  way  to  him- 
self— to  pass  that  same  afternoon  down  the  very  street  in 
which  the  Mays  lived.  He  stopped  his  brougham  at  their 
door  and  inquired  if  by  any  chance  they  were  in.  To  his 
astonishment  he  learnt  that  they  had  sailed  for  Canada,  and 
might  not  be  back  for  a  couple  of  months. 

"Too  bad,"  he  murmured  as  he  got  back  into  his  carriage. 
He  had  wanted  to  give  Phyllis  May  all  this  China  news, 
as  well  as  to  learn  if  she  had  heard  herself  from  Peter  Kerr. 
Kerr  had  written  to  him  very  little  lately:  he  was  sending 
everything  by  telegraph;  and  though  by  this  means  Sir 
James  Barker  got  all  the  facts,  he  did  not  learn  the  details. 
Barker  had  become  rather  inquisitive  about  a  number  of 
things. 

During  the  evening  he  worked  out  a  long  telegram  himself, 
explaining  fully  the  position  in  London  and  authorizing  Kerr 
to  act  as  he  thought  most  advisable. 

In  the  course  of  the  next  day  he  received  a  brief  reply. 
Kerr  would  stay — indefinitely,  it  said. 

That  very  day  Mrs.  John  West  had  been  laughing 
excitedly  to  herself  in  the  privacy  of  her  own  boudoir.  "One 


384  T  HE   H  U  M  AH;  C  O  B  WE  B 

has  heard  of  bringing  down  two  birds  with  one  stone,"  she 
murmured  as  she  re-read  for  the  twentieth  time  her  Brus- 
sels correspondence,  "but  it  is  surely  unheard  of  to  bring 
down  three  birds  —  that  is,  a  profit,  a  man,  .and  a  girl." 
Then  she  laughed  again,  delighted  with  her  victory. 

In  doing  this  she  was  singularly  wrong;  for  when  one  is 
amused  at  the  expense  of  other  people  one  should  never 
incautiously  assume  that  one  is  really  laughing  last.  ^  >H 


3J(!  o'F     ,nl  oifiw  v>fit  TjfsCflo  V.HJ:  7^  t:   h-sinn/m   S'-np    ioob 
Lnn  j;b«/r<;'J  loi.  L'jlir^  huri  v^ov  jufh  jrns'jJ  osS  jrrHrrii^Kioj^f, 


o  OifitfO'j  i;  i*>    J'-K     jx    'ton   ify^- 
nir.'j  s'.'f  o^nl  ibiid  loi;  '?d  w;  b^ii/nrnjai  ^n  '\bj»d  oo'l'1 


-isfri  mo'ii  ll^Txi  bi/;*>r!  bfui  *)&<.  }\  rrrns.?  oj  >«  Uv//  ^ 
^fi;  fess-^  .*».'(  rvhst/rf  oblli  7'iov  rnirf  <>1  fn.'inv/  herf  IT-JV?. 
7?^  sriRifii  srH?  vd  /i^-rorh  bn^  :  ifq^w-ir/t  yr{  jjnifb'nov^ 
.alifijab  ^Hi  nir/jl  ion  Mb  .*)»!  ,?i'jftt  ^rii  Ik  2ojj  -I'dmH  K:?rn>?i. 
io  t^dfrujii  £  3wod&  ^/'i^Iynjpm  ii>fi3*n  amooa'd  bud  loi'ifJl 


sinpta}  snol  £  3  i/o  bf>3how  3fi  gn/n^va  3fh  gnnuG. 
gnisnoibuK  hm;  nobnoJL  nr  noijiaoq  'Jfli  vln/i  ^ninislqxn 

.^Idi^ivb^  -Jsosri  trf^yoH?  orl  SK  i:»n  ;>^ 

gniriguBl    n^^d    bf-d     i^>W     ndo^     .'''il./L     'f;ib    7_i/>7    ?i;.fi  I 
•>n(JSi     .liobuod  nv;'o  T'»{[  !«:>  vo,r:  /no  adl  .ni  tl^i^f!  <>t  7!b*>lr>x:i 


BOOK  THREE 


CHAPTER  I 

"Dans  Padversite  de  nos  meilleurs  amis,  nous 
trouvons  toujours  quelque  chose  qui  ne  nous 
deplait  pas." — LA  ROCHEFOUCAULD. 

PETER  KERR  was  soon  left  quite  alone. 

There  is  something  peculiarly  disheartening,  something 
crushing,  something  almost  tragic,  in  being  left  behind  on 
the  scene  of  defeat — the  more  so  when  defeat  has  been 
directly  invited  by  folly  and  is  not  merely  the  result  of 
misfortune.  Yet  though  a  man  groans  and  protests,  the 
sun  rises  and  sets  in  the  same  remorseless  way;  the  same 
routine  goes  on  around ;  exactly  the  same  desires  and  wants 
are  felt — Nature,  inexorable  and  indifferent,  must  pursue 
her  appointed  course.  Foolish  is  the  man  indeed  not  to  be  a 
philosopher — a  stoic!  For  what  does  it  matter  if  a  single 
mortal  raises  his  plaints — to-morrow  must  come  as  to-day. 
The  world  moves  relentlessly  on ;  and  though  every  revolu- 
tion is  the  signal  for  the  crushing  out  of  countless  lives 
and  waving  of  endless  farewells,  to-morrow  will  be  just  as 
beautiful  as  to-day  and  in  the  sum  total  there  will  be  more 
laughter  than  tears.  "Man,"  says  Pascal,  "is  the  weakest 
reed  in  the  world — but  it  is  a  reed  that  thinks."  And  this 
is  the  reason  why  he  so  often  cries. 

Four  days  after  the  events  which  have  been  chronicled,  a 
general  exodus  from  the  little  hotel  had  taken  place.  The 
feeling  had  become  so  widespread  that  a  great  reaction  had 
occurred  in  China — rendering  all  other  hopes  for  success  illu- 
sory— that  Lorenzo's  rapid  departure  was  followed  by  that  of 
nearly  every  concession-hunter  and  nondescript  in  the  capital. 
Tall,  polite  Mr.  Smith  sighed  many  times,  and  at  last  openly 
admitted  that  his  great  idea  was  quite  unworkable. 


388  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

"It  is  very  unfortunate,"  he  briefly  commented,  as  very 
diffidently  he  made  his  departure.  Mrs.  Hopeful,  whose 
husband  was  wiring  to  her  from  some  neighbouring  place  to 
hurry  up,  left  at  the  same  tune.r 

"Good-bye,  Mr.  Kerr,"  she  said  as  she  got  on  to  her  cart, 
fixing  on  him  her  great  wistful  eyes,  "Good-bye,  good-bye. 
I  wonder  if  we  shall  ever  meet  again.  Oh,  it  has  been  a 
strange  summer,  and  I  am  sorry  for  you."  And  the  last 
sight  he  had  of  the  little  woman  was  sitting  on  the  shafts 
of  the  retreating  Peking  cart  waving  her  pale  hands  to  him 
from  behind  the  blue  hood,  and  at  the  same  time  urging  her 

old  mule  forward. 

••-..-^    •>,":         :..:.•    itettvf  ffc  #iorn   »»=— iiatah  t      srrv*    |H*J 
The  next  train  carried  off  the  little  Dutchman,  who  had 

creamed  of  dyking  the  dread  Yellow  Kiyer.  "These  dommed 
Chinamen,'*  fie  remarked,  "are  no  use/'  All  tne  French- 
men and  Belgians  followed  at  once,  with  Kerr  standing  at 
the  hall  door,  watching  them  grimly ;  and  an  American,  who 
tiac)  only  been  seventy- two  hours  in  Peking,  started  home 
announcing  that  h is tale  would  be  that  it  looked  as  if  h-r-11 
were  coming.  Kerr  wondered  where  Madame  Boisragon 
had  gone  to.  She  had  disappeared  more  quickly  than  any 

of  tHe  others. 

fox./  .-.-,  ,,7s:';-'>j    1o    31  so  ZiWtiMTj    srJ    lot    jsrr'FA    9U1.  at,  nod 
So  in  four  days  out  of  a  baker  s  dozen  there  remained  only 

Peter  Kerr  and  a  great  collector  of  porcelain,  whose  horizon 
was  entirely  bounded  by  blue  and , white  China,  #nd  blood- 
of-a-bull  vases,  anH  Imperial  Yellow  and  willow-patterns 
and  peach-blossom;  and  who,  buried  in  this  conceit,  cared 
not  what  revolutions  might  be  made  by  God  or  man.  It 
was  remarkable  liow  quickly  the  change  took  place.  As  soon 
as, the  piles  of  portmanteaus  and  trunks  and  wooden  cases 
haii  disappeared  and  left  the  hotel  noiseless  and  empty,  a  new 
era  Had  manifestly  commenced! "'i  \  f 

Cafnot^  dismally  reflecting  on  the  changed  times,  soon 
made  it  his  habit  to  visit  Peter  Kerr  twice  a  day— once  in 
the  morning  and  once  in  the  afternoon— when  he  poured 
out  a  ceaseless  stream  of  reflectionSj  prognostications,  warn- 


T  H  E   HUMAN   C  O  B  W  B  B  389 

ings,  gossip,  jests,  and  storiettesv  It  >was  a  dull  world,  ;*<; 
stupid  world,  a  brutal  world  out  here-^-people  should  never 
come  to  it,  he  said.  What  the  devil  were  they  all  doing 
anyway?  Oh,  the  world  was  full  of  fools!  Y«t  through  all 
this,  in  spite  of  his  laments,  Carnot  let  his  conviction  be 
known  that  they  were  living  in  most  historic  times,  and 
that  even  if  a  doubtful  moment  loomed  up  for  the  finances  of 
his  curious  little  hotel,  he  would  have  the  compensation  of 
knowing  that  he  had  been  present  in  China  at  a  great  inter- 
national turning-point.  So  at  heart  quite  undaunted  he 
went  on  boasting,  jesting,  exaggerating,  and  ridiculing. 

There  was  something  oddly  comforting  to  Kerr  in  the 
man's  bravado,  which  was  only  a  peculiar  mannerism  and 
a  mask  to  real  bravery.  He  affected  to  laugh  and  treat 
both  the  affairs  of  nations  and  his  own  affairs  with  con- 
tempt—when  the  frowning  aspect  of  the  capital  meant  r*o5 
guests  and  no  money  for  him.  Well,  he  would  live  some- 
how! 

"If  necessary,"  he  cried,  "I  will  dash  into  the  Palace- 
seize  the  old  lady  who  is  such  a  .nuisance — and  force  them 
to  ransom  her  for  a  million!  What  do  you  think  of  the 
idea— it  is  daring — heinf 

Lorenzo  had  been  so  busy  during  the  last  few  hours  of  his 
stay  that  after  his  momentous  interview  with  his  friend 
he  had  only  been  able  to  say  very  few  words  to  Kerr.  It 
had  been  necessary  for  him  to  secure  the  proper  diplomatic; 
recording  of  his  phenomenal  success— and  thus  to  place 
beyond  the  reach  of  danger  his  priceless  concession.  His  con- 
cession was  now  his  own  by  Imperial  Edict,  his  very  own  for 
fifty  years — and  that  vital  fact  had  to  be  registered  and  embla- 
zoned in  every  possible  way.  Ministers  Plenipotentiary,  now 
that  he  was  going  and  his  good  will  might  be  useful,  were 
good  enough  to  tell  him  that  he  had  scored  a  greater  per- 
sonal success  than  any  one  of  them— and  each  expressed  signal 
willingness  to  listen  to  the  story  of  how  it  had  been  managed. 
But  Lorenzo  did  not  propose  to  divulge  his  methods  just 


390  THE   HUMAN    COBWEB 

yet;  and  in  the  face  of  such  inquiries  he  became  pleasantly 
vague.  It  was  all  too  complicated,  he  said,  to  be  told  in  a 
brief  conversation.  Some  day,  he  explained,  he  would  set 
forth  his  methods  at  length,  and  then  they  might  see  how 
curious  a  thing  was  Chinese  diplomacy — which  was  rather  a 
cruel  riposte  to  Envoys  Extraordinary  duly  accredited  to 
an  Eastern  Court  and  themselves  ostensibly  concerned  with 
conducting  clever  and  tortuous  negotiations.  And  thus, 
buried  in  strange  mystery  up  to  the  very  end,  did  Lorenzo 
make  his  exit. 

From  the  railway  terminus  lying  so  far  outside  the  city 
walls,  however,  Kerr  received  back  from  him  a  brief  pen- 
cilled note  on  the  morning  of  his  departure.  The  big  fat 
laughing  Chinaman,  who  had  welcomed  Kerr  on  his  arrival 
so  few  months  before  when  he  had  been  so  full  of  hope,  was 
the  bearer  of  this  message,  digging  it  out  of  his  pocket  just 
as  he  dug  out  the  other  soiled  piece  of  paper  on  which  had 
been  inscribed  Kerr's  name. 

Lorenzo  had  hurriedly  written: 

MY  DEAR  KERR:  The  train  is  about  to  start,  and  before  shaking 
off  the  Peking  dust  from  my  boots  I  should  like  to  thank  you  once 
more  for  your  general  assistance  during  our  partnership.  I  will 
be  able  to  deal  with  matters  in  London,  I  have  no  doubt,  to  our 
mutual  satisfaction:  in  Peking,  confine  yourself  to  picking  up  all 
the  wreckage  you  can. 

A  Captain  Emm  will  one  day  come  to  see  you.  You  can  trust 
him  implicitly.  I  would  warn  you  that  the  political  situation  has 
had  a  number  of  new  secret  factors  introduced.  Yesterday's  great 
men  have  become  to-day's  nobodies.  It  is  like  the  stock-markets: 
you  must  always  follow  the  rise  and  fall.  Remember  that! 

Yours  truly, 

PIETRO  LORENZO. 

In  which  characteristic  way  did  Lorenzo  make  his  good- 
bye. Well,  thought  Kerr,  taking  fresh  courage  since  his 
great  idea  was  admittedly  exploded,  he  would  now  take 
advantage  of  all  his  practical  experience  and  plunge  boldly 
in  to  secure  the  wreckage — as  Lorenzo  put  it.  Perhaps  he 


THE   HUMAN  COBWEB  391 

would  be  able  to  forget  many  things  by  forcing  himself  at 
once  to  fresh  activity.     He  would  see.     .     .     . 

It  would  not  have  been  so  bitter  for  him  had  not  the  story 
of  his  failure  become  very  soon  something  of  a  local  cause 
celebre.  Though  he  was  quite  certain  that  Lorenzo  had 
never  spoken  a  word,  somehow  a  garbled  version  of  how 
he  had  been  beaten  when  within  an  ace  of  succeeding  became 
the  constant  subject  of  diplomatic  whispers.  The  two  men 
who  belonged  to  the  place  and  who  had  been  present 
at  Mrs.  Hopeful's  seance  had  been  eagerly  questioned  as  to 
what  had  really  taken  place — and  they  had  as  good  as 
admitted  that  anything  may  have  occurred.  The  clash  of  the 
iron  lid  of  the  despatch-box,  because  it  had  taken  place  in 
the  dark,  had  been  easily  turned  into  a  revolver-shot  by 
people  who  preferred  fiction  to  fact;  and  it  was  now  boldly 
said  by  some  that  Kerr,  hearing  that  he  was  being  rifled 
during  the  alleged  spirit-rapping,  had  actually  fired  in  the 
direction  of  the  sound  and  that  a  lady  had  been  shot  in  the 
arm!  A  general  melee  had  immediately  ensued,  in  which 
several  had  played  a  very  inglorious  part.  Carnot  had  finally 
ended  the  tragedy  by  breaking  open  the  doors,  and  with  the 
aid  of  his  servants  had  forced  every  one  to  capitulate  and  be 
tied  up  pending  an  unofficial  inquiry! 

Such  was  the  story,  Kerr  was  assured,  which  was  being  cir- 
culated, with  variations  to  suit  various  tastes.  People  desired 
something  surprising,  something  sensational,  something 
unheard  of — something  to  fit  the  times  arid  the  lowering 
political  horizon — and  they  got  it!  De  Boyar,  seeing  how 
things  were  going,  gradually  and  discreetly  made  it  one  of 
his  best  stories.  He  had  first  one  revolver-shot — then  two — 
then  plenty  of  revolver-shots!  It  had  been  a  little  battle 
a  I* americaine ,  he  said.  Lorenzo  had  flung  himself  on  Mr. 
Smith  and  nearly  choked  that  polite  gentleman  to  death; 
Mrs.  Hopeful  in  her  excitement  had  bitten  the  Spaniard  in 
the  leg — so  badly  that  they  had  to  carry  him  home  on  a 
stretcher;  everybody  had  done  something  wonderful  whilst 


392  THE   HUMAN    COBWEB 

they  were  in  the  hypnotic  state;  he  could  not  venture  to  say 
what  he  had  done!  And  then  when  he  was  alone  with 
Baroness  Waffen  he  added  all  sorts  of  other  details  of  a 
more  intimate  nature  which  made  Baroness  Waffen  shake 
with  laughter.  De  Boyar  was  really  irrepressible. 

It  was  very  hard  for  Kerr  to  face  all  this,  but  he  managed 
to  preserve  an  indifferent  attitude,  and  never  to  give  any 
one  the  chance  to  question  him.  He  remembered  incessantly 
just  then  the  caustic  reflection  of  a  former  tutor  of  his — that 
most  moderns  unite  a  roving  sensuality  with  a  keen  business 
instinct.  It  was  a  saying  worth  remembering. 

What  stung  him  worst  of  all  was  to  hear  one  day  the 
young  attache  who  had  gone  to  the  Great  Wall  with  them 
saying  that  he  had  been  fooled  by  a  woman — in  the  most 
open  way  possible.  Yes,  it  was  quite  true,  he  had  been 
fooled  with  his  eyes  open.  Yet  even  now  when  he  closed 
his  eyes  he  still  felt  the  strange  charm  which  Madame  Bois- 
ragon's  coldness  had  for  him,  and  he  could  still  believe  that 
he  would  succumb  as  easily  again. 

What  was  it,  he  wondered,  going  over  many  scenes  once 
more.  She  had  been  reticent  even  in  moments  of  passion — 
she  had  always  seemed  far  away  from  him — cold,  oh  yes, 
cold.  Perhaps  it  was  that — yet  who  really  liked  to  clasp 
marble  ?  It  was  a  pure  viciousness  on  his  part — one  of  those 
obsessions  called  into  being  by  the  interplay  of  conflicting 
personalities.  Only  when,  mad  with  rage,  he  had  been  ready 
to  strike  her  savagely,  had  she  begun  to  melt  and  show  the 
real  woman.  What  might  not  he  have  learnt  had  Lorenzo 
not  intervened!  She  might  have  spoken  to  him  truly — told 
him  things  that  had  always  puzzled  him.  What  had  her 
motives  been  from  the  beginning — why  had  she  really  done 
what  she  had  done?  That  part  seemed  stranger  to  him 
than  his  own  actions.  It  was  he  in  any  case  who  was  respon- 
sible— she  had  held  back,  had  tried  to  hold  him  at  arm's 
length.  Oh,  yes,  he  was  sure  of  that.  And  now,  in  spite  of 
everything  that  had  happened,  he  missed  her.  And  that 
perhaps  was  the  bitterest  cpnfessipn  of  all. 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  393 

A  hundred  times  he  went  over  his  last  scene  with  her, 
dwelling  on  his  violence  with  a  wondering  brain.  Blows — 
how  foolish  they  really  were — they  were  nothing  but 
attempted  short-cuts  back  to  lost  roads!  If  a  man  in 
anger  could  realize  that!  For  just  as  the  traveller,  filled 
with  anger  at  the  puzzling  gloom  around  him,  darts  rapidly 
off  here  and  there,  searching  in  vain  for  the  good  way 
which  has  so  mysteriously  disappeared,  only  to  involve 
himself  inevitably  in  some  fresh  predicament,  so  does  the 
man  who  proposes  to  act  as  he  proposed  to  act  plunge 
himself  in  greater  distress.  That  is  what  Lorenzo  evidently 
most  clearly  understood.  Yes — he  was  sure  of  it. 

He  had  frequently  marvelled  in  secret  at  Lorenzo's  atti- 
tude towards  him — Lorenzo,  that  mediaeval-minded  yet 
philosophic  man.  Now  that  Lorenzo  was  gone  and  it  might 
be  a  long  time  before  they  met  again,  Kerr  began  to  appre- 
ciate a  side  of  his  character  to  which  he  had  previously  given 
scant  attention.  Lorenzo  had  been  singularly  discreet — 
he  had  always  remained  in  the  background,  watchful,  sus- 
picious, a  little  cynical,  but  never  overstepping  certain  defi- 
nite bounds  which  he  had  evidently  set  himself.  It  was  not 
his  business  to  advise  a  fully-grown  man — he  had  warned 
him  in  his  own  curious  way ;  and  circumstances  had  only  too 
clearly  proved  that  he  had  been  quite  right  in  all  his 
assumptions. 

As  the  weeks  went  by  and  the  man  became  only  a  memory, 
Lorenzo  assumed  his  true  proportions.  To  Peter  Kerr, 
used  mainly  to  conventional  types  of  men — Englishmen  who 
were  just  good  or  bad  or  indifferent  in  a  very  stereotyped 
way — Lorenzo  soon  became  an  extraordinary  man,  exem- 
plifying what  has  been  frequently  said  of  the  Italians — that 
they  are  the  cleverest  people  in  Europe.  He  was  so  supple 
and  yet  so  devoted  to  the  pursuit  of  true  strategy — that  is, 
following  a  definite  line  with  all  possible  ardour.  That  was 
the  Napoleonic  principle,  as  well  as  the  triumphant  principle 
in  all  walks  of  life.  And  the  apotheosis  of  Lorenzo  was  his 
concession — a  concession  covering  an  area  able  to  supply  the 


394  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

whole  world  with  coal  and  iron  for  centuries,  it  was  said. 
With  his  eight  thousand  pounds  and  his  ingenuity  Lorenzo 
had  done  that.  How  trivial  appeared  all  the  others  beside 
this  man! 

Peter  Kerr  had  ample  time  to  reflect  on  all  these  things  as 
he  sat  alone — and  reflect  he  did,  with  a  persistence  which 
never  flagged. 


CHAPTER  II 

"Entre  tard  et  trop  tard,  il  y  a,  par  la  grace  de 
Dieu,     une     distance     incommensurable." — MME. 

SWETCHINE. 

THE  blue-coated  boy  brought  in  the  card  to  Kerr  in  his 
usual  nonchalant  way,  as  if  nothing  in  the  world  ever  sur- 
prised or  interested  him,  as  if  even  to  take  these  few  steps  to 
his  master  was  a  bore.  Kerr  read  the  card  which  was  handed 
him  with  a  curious  thrill  of  interest.  On  it  was  printed  in 
great  ungainly  Gothic  lettering,  bespeaking  eloquently  the 
limitations  of  Eastern  printing-offices,  just  this: 

CAPTAIN  EMM. 

There  was  nothing  below  the  name  to  show  whether  Cap- 
tain Emm  was  white  or  yellow;  whether  he  was  the  com- 
mander of  a  coasting-vessel  or  of  a  squadron  of  cavalry; 
whether  he  resided  in  China  or  in  Timbuctoo.  That  copious 
data,  to  which  temporary  residence  in  a  diplomatic  centre 
had  already  accustomed  Kerr  on  such  a  reputed  credential 
as  a  visiting-card,  was  totally  lacking.  Who  was  Captain 
Emm? 

"Show  him  up,"  said  Kerr  after  a  moment's  reflection. 
The  boy  retired,  closed  the  door  behind  him,  and  immedi- 
ately reopened  it  with  a  sudden  jerk,  which  sent  a  gust  of 
wind  across  the  room.  Captain  Emm,  doubtless  acting  on 
strategic  principles — or  perhaps  prompted  by  the  lazy  ser- 
vant— had  evidently  followed  his  card  upstairs.  Indeed, 
whilst  Kerr  was  deliberating  he  must  have  been  just  outside 
the  door.  Now,  with  a  preliminary  cough,  he  quickly  entered 
the  room.  His  step  was  firm  and  somehow  carried  instant 
conviction. 

"Good-morning,"  he  said  briefly  in  a  monotonous,  colour- 


396  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

less  voice,  shaking  hands  with  decision  and  vigour.  "Yes, 
I  will  sit  down,  certainly.  Thank  you." 

He  bestowed  himself  on  a  chair  with  stiff  precision. 

Kerr,  whilst  they  exchanged  a  few  preliminary  remarks, 
studied  him  closely  and  wondered  who  he  really  was.  In 
aspect,  without  being  remarkable  he  was  somewhat  singular. 
He  was  a  lean,  loosely-knit  man  of  more  than  the  average 
height — perhaps  forty  years  old.  He  was  neatly  dressed  in 
a  rather  foreign  way;  the  hat  in  his  hand  was  old  but  care- 
fully brushed;  and  finally  he  was  the  possessor  of  a  big, 
bronzed  face  curiously  resembling  that  of  a  horse.  A  heavy 
moustache  hid  his  mouth;  his  hair  was  a  little  grizzly  at 
the  temples;  his  nose  was  long  and  decisive;  and  he  fre- 
quently cleared  his  throat  as  if  it  were  a  constant  source 
of  trouble  to  him.  He  immediately  intimated  that  he  would 
neither  smoke  nor  drink — evidently  for  these  lax  latitudes 
he  was  singularly  abstemious.  His  small  twinkling  eyes 
appeared  to  contemplate  the  world  from  over  his  big  mous- 
tache with  curious  unemotion. 

"Mr.  Lorenzo  asked  me  to  come  and  see  you,"  he  said 
finally.  "If  there  is  anything  I  can  do  for  you,  I  shall  be 
most  happy."  He  stopped  speaking  just  as  he  had  be'run — 
that  is,  as  if  he  were  a  rusty  machine-gun  which  fired  off  a 
few  rounds  reluctantly  and  then  jammed. 

"You  are  very  kind,"  replied  Kerr.  "I  shall  certainly  take 
advantage  of  your  offer  if  I  can.  I  suppose  you  have  known 
Lorenzo  for  a  long  time." 

"For  two  weeks." 

"Oh,"  said  Kerr,  somewhat  surprised  and  secretly  tickled 
at  his  visitor's  brief  answer.  "I  thought  you  were  an  old 
friend  from  what  Lorenzo  told  me." 

Captain  Emm  hesitated  a  moment,  as  if  any  answer  might 
be  indiscreet. 

"I  know  Mr.  Lorenzo  very  well,"  he  said  at  length. 

"Really,"  continued  Kerr,  "then  you  have  probably  had 
business  relations  with  him." 

The  ghost  of  a  smile  suddenly  emerged  for  a  moment  from 


THE   HUMAN    COBWEB  397 

behind  the  cover  of  the  big  moustache  and  as  quickly  disap- 
peared. The  reflection  must  have  been  decidedly  humorous, 
for  the  little  eyes  twinkled  very  fast  until  the  mouth  sud- 
denly bade  them  be  quiet. 

"It  was  business,"  said  this  singular  man  finally,  as  if  he 
were  stating  an  irrelevant  fact.  Kerr  did  not  take  his  eyes 
off  his  face. 

"Well,  you  were  dealing  with  a  master  in  the  art  of  Ori- 
ental business.  There  was  little  Lorenzo  did  not  know," 
he  commented. 

"He  was  very  clever,  certainly,"  said  his  visitor. 

It  was  now  clear  that  Captain  Emm  was  of  an  uncommu- 
nicative type.  Evidently  he  did  not  propose  to  disclose  any- 
thing of  his  relations  with  the  Italian,  whatever  they  may 
have  been.  So  Kerr  shifted  his  ground  and  began  the  at- 
tack from  another  quarter. 

"You  don't  live  in  Peking,  of  course,"  he  inquired. 

"No,"  said  his  visitor  with  decided  emphasis.  "Oh,  no,  I 
live  in  the  country." 

Kerr  wondered  what  sort  of  men  lived  the  country  life  in 
China  apart  from  missionaries,  but  he  carefully  refrained 
from  asking.  Doubtlessly  Carnot  could  tell  him.  Anyway 
Lorenzo  had  said  that  this  man  was  an  ally:  and  Lorenzo, 
when  he  was  really  serious,  always  spoke  the  absolute  truth, 
so  there  was  no  reason  to  be  on  his  guard. 

"Will  you  be  long  in  Peking  this  time?"  he  asked. 

"Perhaps  for  several  hours — perhaps  for  several  weeks." 

Kerr  began  to  see  light. 

"I  understand,"  he  said.  "You  await  orders,  and  when  you 
get  them  you  may  have  to  jump  for  it  to  reach  your  desti- 
nation." 

"Exactly,"  said  Captain  Emm  gravely. 

"Well,  if  I  could  only  be  sure  of  seeing  you  again,  I  might 
begin  by  telling  you  some  of  my  difficulties  and  asking  your 
help." 

"You  can  see  me  very  easily  as  long  as  I  am  here,"  said 
Captain  Emm. 


398  THE  HUMAN   COBWEB 

"I  am  glad  of  that,"  remarked  his  host.  "Where  are  you 
staying?" 

Captain  Emm  bent  forward  and  coughed  several  times  and 
at  last  pointed  a  finger  at  the  wall. 

"A  few  inches  of  lath  and  plaster  only  separate  us;  I  have 
the  very  next  room  to  yours,"  he  said  briefly,  when  he  had 
mastered  his  recalcitrant  throat. 

Kerr  could  hardly  refrain  from  laughing. 

"That  is  rather  funny,"  he  remarked,  "if  one  sees  it  in  the 
right  way." 

The  horselike  face  relented  a  little  and  looked  on  the  world 
less  mournfully. 

"It  is  convenient  at  least  if  we  wish  to  see  each  other,"  he 
said. 

"What  I  really  want  to  know,"  began  Kerr  again,  attempt- 
ing, to  get  interested,  and  lighting  a  cigarette,  "is  whom  can 
one  trust  in  this  town?  If  I  could  only  know  that  I  should 
feel  somewhat  happier." 

Captain  Emm  looked  surprised — almost  grieved,  in  fact,  by 
this  inquiry. 

"No  one  can  be  trusted,"  he  answered  quite  cheerfully. 

For  the  second  time  Kerr  laughed.  Instead  of  depressing 
him,  this  matter-of-fact  attitude  was  somehow  eminently  re- 
assuring. 

"But  then  it  is  rather  hopeless  work  trying  to  do  any- 
thing," he  protested.  "In  a  quagmire  one  can  only  go  un- 
der." 

"It  is  hopeless  work,"  admitted  Captain  Emm  gravely,  not 
noticing  the  metaphor.  "But  though  it  is  in  a  way  hope- 
less, it  is  still  possible  to  accomplish  results — big  results. 
Look  what  Mr.  Lorenzo  did.  When  he  came  to  China  he 
had  not  a  single  friend:  when  he  left,  a  dozen  men  were 
ready  to  do  his  bidding.  And  a  hundred  more  were  waiting 
to  be  tempted !" 

"Ah!"  ejaculated  Kerr.  He  was  encouraged.  Captain 
Emm  had  made  the  longest  speech  during  his  visit  on  an  im- 
personal issue:  he  would  follow  it  up. 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  399 

"Well,  what  do  you  advise  in  my  case?  I  suppose  you  have 
heard  all  about  my  business?" 

"Yes,"  said  Captain  Emm.     "I  know  all  details,  I  think." 

He  pondered  a  bit  and  cleared  his  throat. 

"Have  you  a  map,"  he  asked,  "a  plain,  large-scale  map  of 
north  China?" 

"Yes,"  said  Kerr,  producing  one. 

Captain  Emm  took  it  in  his  hands,  studied  it  for  a  while, 
and  then  began  speaking. 

"The  Manchus  are  the  only  people  of  importance  in  this 
country,"  he  announced.  If  his  manner  had  not  been  so  sim- 
ple his  words  would  have  sounded  bombastic.  "The  oth- 
ers  "  He  snapped  his  fingers  in  unemotional  contempt. 

"Try  to  secure  railways  convenient  for  the  use  of  the  Man- 
chus— railways  which  they  could  use  if  necessity  compelled 
them.  Look — here  and  here  and  here."  He  marked  out 
with  his  strong  fingers  imaginary  lines,  leading  apparently 
from  Peking  towards  the  vast  western  provinces  and  the 
deserts  of  Central  Asia. 

Kerr  gazed  at  him  in  open  surprise;  Captain  Emm  as  an 
expert  railway  adviser  seemed  rather  odd. 

"But,"  he  objected,  "that  is  all  very  well.  What  you  say 
may  be  politically  sound,  still  those  lines  are  commercially 
valueless.  It  would  not  pay  to  construct  them.  It  would 
pay  neither  the  Chinese  nor  the  contractors." 

Captain  Emm  laughed  a  short,  dry  laugh. 

"What  do  you  care?"  he  said.  "What  you  want  first  is 
that  your  name  should  become  known  to  the  Court ;  then  the 
rest  will  follow.  You  must  interest  the  only  people  who 
count  in  the  country." 

Kerr  reflected  as  he  studied  the  map. 

"Nobody  has  even  made  a  rough  survey  in  the  regions  you 
suggest,"  he  replied,  though  he  wanted  to  say  that  he  had 
spent  a  good  deal  of  money  attempting  to  interest  a  very  big 
Manchu. 

Captain  Emm  shrugged  his  shoulders. 

"Send  some  one  to  ride  through  them,"  he  said.     "They 


400  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

know  nothing  in  the  Palace  about  costs.  Make  a  rough  es- 
timate and  interest  them.  It  is  the  only  way." 

Kerr  decided  to  conciliate  him.  This  man  had  his  own 
ideas.  Later  he  most  certainly  could  be  made  of  use. 

"It  is  certainly  worth  thinking  over,"  he  rejoined  diplo- 
matically. "I  will  look  into  the  matter — to-morrow  at  the 
latest.  Now  there  is  another  question  I  should  like  to  ask 
you.  Do  you  know  anything  about  this  Prince?" 

He  mentioned  the  name  of  the  dignitary  with  whom  he  had 
had  such  eventful  dealings,  and  tried  to  discover  from  his 
visitor's  face  what  he  really  thought  of  him. 

"He  is  corrupt — very  corrupt — everybody  bribes  him,"  said 
Captain  Emm  gravely.  "How  much  have  you  paid  him?" 

Kerr,  though  he  was  somewhat  taken  aback  at  the  direct- 
ness with  which  Captain  Emm  went  to  the  point,  calmly 
consulted  a  note-book. 

"About  eight  thousand  pounds,"  he  answered. 

Captain  Emm  immediately  whistled  in  a  droll  sort  of  way, 
as  if  his  lips  had  been  scalded.  He  did  it  too  somewhat  me- 
chanically and  unmusically,  as  if  his  lips  had  no  real  rela- 
tionship to  his  face  or  his  body;  it  was  just  a  little  private 
escapade  on  their  part  which  he  was  powerless  to  prevent. 

"That  is  far  too  much,"  he  said  at  length.  "Eight  thou- 
sand pounds  out  here  has  the  purchasing-power  of  eighty 
thousand  in  England.  Did  you  know  that?" 

He  seemed  to  be  thrown  into  melancholy  at  the  idea  of 
such  waste;  for  he  studied  the  wall  lugubriously  for  some 
time  before  speaking  again.  Kerr  left  him  with  his  thoughts. 

"What  is  the  Prince  doing  for  you  now?"  he  inquired 
finally. 

"Nothing." 

"Nothing !    The  rascal !    Have  you  tried  frightening  him  ?" 

"No,"  said  Kerr.     "I  have  certainly  not  tried  that  yet." 

Captain  Emm  cleared  his  throat  and  his  eyes  twinkled  rap- 
idly. 

"Frighten  him,"  he  said,  "be  rude.     Hammer  the  table." 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  401 

"Supposing  that  is  no  use?"  replied  Kerr,  smiling  at  the 
scene  which  these  words  conjured  up. 

"Frighten  him  more.  Be  more  rude.  Hammer  the  table 
more." 

"And  then?" 

"After  that  ask  me  again,"  said  Captain  Emm  cautiously. 
"I  will  give  you  an  address:  if  I  am  not  here  you  can  write 
to  me  and  get  an  answer  in  twenty-four  hours.  I  would  like 
to  see  that  experiment  tried." 

He  rose  abruptly  and  put  out  his  hand.  When  he  was 
gone  Kerr  did  not  know  whether  to  laugh  or  feel  annoyed. 
Captain  Emm  had  certainly  shaken  him  up.  He  was  a  new 
type — also  a  tonic  from  the  mere  fact  that  he  was  an  original 
who  cared  only  for  his  own  line  of  argument  and  did  not 
seem  to  understand  anything  else. 

That  was  their  first  meeting.  The  second  occurred  that 
very  evening  at  eleven  o'clock.  At  that  hour  Kerr,  who  was 
going  to  his  rooms,  found  Captain  Emm  writing  at  a  table 
close  to  his  open  door.  Consequently  Kerr  paused  to  say 
good-evening:  Captain  Emm  promptly  begged  him  to  enter. 
Captain  Emm  seemed  infinitely  more  affable  now  that  his 
strangeness  had  worn  off.  His  little  eyes  were  twinkling 
fast  and  his  whole  body  looked  relaxed. 

"I  heard  a  good  story  to-day,"  he  said  as  soon  as  Kerr  was 
seated.  "I  think  I  will  tell  it  to  you.  It  will  help  you  to 
understand  something  of  the  methods  of  this  country." 

He  began  clearing  his  throat.  Kerr  sank  into  a  chair  and 
hid  his  mouth  behind  a  cloth  cap  he  had  in  his  hand.  Cap- 
tain Emm  in  the  role  of  a  story-teller  should  be  very  good, 
for  he  certainly  would  have  something  original  or  quaint  to 
relate. 

"I  shall  be  very  pleased  to  hear  it,"  he  remarked. 

Captain  Emm  busied  himself  first  in  neatly  packing  up  his 
writing.  When  he  had  finished,  he  placed  his  papers  in  a 
portfolio,  which  he  locked.  He  then  rose,  and  opening  a 


402  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

battered  trunk,  put  the  portfolio  inside,  and  once  again  used 
his  keys.  After  that  he  threw  a  travelling-rug  over  the 
trunk  and  arranged  some  spare  boots  on  top.  It  was  all 
done  with  a  method  and  an  amount  of  attention  curiously 
comical.  Kerr  was  glad  he  had  his  cloth  cap  conveniently 
near  his  mouth.  This  man  was  certainly  utterly  unlike  those 
he  had  met  hitherto. 

Captain  Emm,  being  now  reasonably  satisfied  regarding  the 
security  of  his  papers,  came  back  to  his  seat  and  squared  his 
shoulders. 

"This  is  a  good  story,"  he  announced  abruptly,  "though  it 
may  surprise  you.  One  of  the  chief  things  in  China,  how- 
ever, is  never  to  be  surprised — not  even  if  the  sky  falls  down 
and  you  have  to  hold  it  up  with  your  hands." 

After  which  curious  pronouncement  Captain  Emm  smiled 
to  himself  in  satisfaction  and  began.  He  spoke  exactly  as  if 
he  were  reciting  a  lesson  learnt  by  heart. 

"In  the  town  of  Nao-ning-fu  there  lived  the  other  day  a 
rich  old  Chinaman  of  seventy.  He  was  a  widower,  his  wife 
having  died  many  years  before.  He  had  one  son,  who  was 
engaged  in  business  in  a  distant  province,  having  bitterly 
quarrelled  with  his  father  over  money  matters.  During  the 
son's  absence  the  old  man  had  finally  taken  the  advice  of  his 
friends  and  married  a  young  wife,  hoping  to  have  other 
children.  Several  years  passed,  however,  and  his  hopes  were 
not  realized.  So  accordingly,  feeling  that  he  was  becoming 
very  old,  he  at  length  sent  for  the  prodigal  and  effected  a 
reconciliation  with  him.  Family  custom  and  ancestor-wor- 
ship demanded  that  the  son  should  be  available  when  he  was 
carried  to  the  tomb,  or  else  disgrace  would  come.  So  the 
son  lived  peacefully  in  his  father's  house  until  the  day  came 
when  his  father  died. 

"It  so  happened  that  the  old  man's  death  was  most  oppor- 
tune. Very  few  months  went  by  before  the  young  widow 
gave  birth  to  a  child,  and  the  scandal  in  the  town  of  Nao- 
ning-fu  was  very  great.  There  was  indeed  no  other  topic 
of  conversation.  Not  only  would  the  large  family  posses- 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  403 

sions  be  forfeited  to  distant  relatives  if  it  could  be  proved 
that  the  old  man  was  not  the  father  of  this  child,  but  what 
is  more,  the  young  widow  and  the  presumptive  father — the 
son  who  had  returned  home  a  year  before — would  be  guilty 
of  one  of  the  greatest  Chinese  crimes,  and  instant  strangula- 
tion would  be  their  reward. 

''Well,  it  was  not  long  before  trouble  began.  A  host  of 
relatives  of  the  old  man,  cousins,  half-brothers,  aunts,  uncles, 
and  many  others,  speedily  took  action.  A  great  deputation 
proceeded  to  the  magistrate's  Yamen  and  swore  that  an 
incestuous  act  had  been  committed.  They  demanded  that 
not  only  should  the  widow  and  young  man  be  rewarded 
with  strangulatiop  for  their  sin,  but,  what  was  more  to  the 
point,  the  property  should  be  divided  amongst  them  equally, 
since  direct  succession  had  failed.  So  important  was  the  af- 
fair that  the  governor  of  the  city  speedily  took  the  matter 
into  his  hands,  and  the  young  widow  and  the  son  were 
promptly  seized  and  flung  into  prison  pending  their  formal 
trial. 

"Fortunately  for  himself,  the  son  had  been  given  timely 
warning  of  what  was  coming;  and  before  his  arrest,  speed- 
ing to  one  of  the  most  celebrated  literati  of  the  city,  he  had 
implored  his  assistance.  For  twenty  thousand  taels,  paid  to 
him  in  advance  in  shoes  of  silver,  the  learned  man  promised 
to  find  a  complete  rebuttal  to  the  chain  of  circumstantial 
evidence  which  would  be  brought  forward :  the  only  thing  he 
enjoined  on  the  guilty  couple  was  complete  and  absolute  si- 
lence until  they  heard  from  him.  They  must  remain  as 
silent  as  the  tomb,  even  under  torture.  He  would  supply 
the  defence  in  due  course.  So  no  sooner  had  the  prison  re- 
ceived the  son  and  his  paramour  than  the  learned  man  set  to 
work. 

"First,  by  means  of  secret  inquiries,  he  discovered  exactly 
who  could  gain  access  to  the  young  widow's  house  during 
the  lifetime  of  the  old  man  without  exciting  suspicion.  He 
found  that  only  one  class  of  men  ever  entered  the  women's 
courtyards — washmen  carrying  home  the  wash.  Even  the 


404  THE   HUMAN    COBWEB 

water-coolies  did  not  go  to  those  courtyards.  So  forthwith 
he  went  to  every  washing  establishment  in  the  city,  seeking 
for  men  with  some  marked  peculiarity.  For  a  long  time  his 
search  was  fruitless,  but  at  length,  when  he  almost  despaired 
of  success,  fortune  favoured  him.  He  found  a  youth  whose 
left  hand  had  all  the  ringers  missing.  They  had  been 
crushed  in  some  accident  in  a  wheat-grinding  shop  when  he 
was  a  young  boy.  For  a  few  taels  the  learned  man  duly  ar- 
ranged his  co-operation,  and  a  few  more  taels  secured  that  an 
important  message  should  be  carried  by  the  gaolers  into  the 
prison. 

"The  day  of  trial  duly  arrived,  and  a  host  of  witnesses, 
drawn  from  the  ranks  of  the  needy  relatives,  deposed  all 
manner  of  lies.  It  was  clear,  they  said,  how  matters  had 
gone:  every  one  was  aware  of  it.  They  entered  into  the 
most  private  details  with  whole-hearted  zest — details  which 
it  is  unnecessary  here  to  mention.  The  young  son  absolutely 
denied  all  these  stories,  and  even  torture  failed  to  break  down 
his  stoicism.  Convinced  at  length  that  nothing  could  be 
learnt  from  him,  the  magistrates  ordered  him  to  be  removed. 
Then  the  young  widow  was  brought  in. 

"Though  she  was  the  colour  of  death,  neither  did  this  young 
woman's  self-possession  desert  her  in  this  great  crisis:  she 
affirmed  unfalteringly  the  complete  innocence  of  her  step- 
son. Pressed  by  the  magistrates  to  account  for  the  phenom- 
enon of  her  giving  birth  to  a  child  when  years  of  cohabita- 
tion with  her  old  husband  had  proved  the  impossibility  of 
his  becoming  a  father,  she  at  length  gave  way  and  said  that, 
though  shame  suffocated  her,  she  would  tell  the  truth. 

"This  was  her  story. 

"She  said  that  one  summer  evening  nearly  a  year  before, 
when  it  was  becoming  dusk,  a  young  man  had  brought  in 
washing  from  the  city.  He  had  talked  to  her  for  some  time, 
and  at  length,  yielding  to  her  feelings,  she  had  abandoned 
herself  for  a  few  minutes  to  his  embraces.  Terrified  the 
next  day  with  the  possibility  of  her  guilt  being  discovered, 
she  had  taken  good  care  never  again  to  see  the  youth.  She 


THE   HUMAN    COBWEB  405 

could  give  no  description  of  his  appearance,  as  it  had  been 
almost  dark:  only  she  knew  that  as  she  clasped  his  hands 
when  he  was  going,  she  had  discovered  that  his  left  hand 
was  mutilated,  the  fingers  being  missing. 

"This  remarkable  story,  though  entirely  disbelieved,  pro- 
duced a  most  profound  impression  in  the  magistrates'  court. 
It  was  so  unexpected  that  no  one  knew  what  to  reply.  The 
relatives  raised  a  storm  of  protests:  then  they  laughed  at  the 
tale.  It  was  invented,  they  said. 

"The  magistrates,  however,  to  forward  the  interests  of  jus- 
tice, had  to  order  a  search  to  be  made  in  all  the  wash-houses 
of  the  city  to  discover  if  there  was  a  youth  answering  the 
description  which  had  been  given.  At  the  end  of  two  or 
three  days  the  Yamen  runners  discovered  that  a  young  man 
with  his  left  hand  mutilated  had  actually  gone  into  hiding 
a  short  time  before.  The  magistrates'  scepticism  was  turned 
into  astonishment:  they  ordered  the  immediate  discovery  and 
arrest  of  the  youth.  He  was  at  length  tracked  down  and 
brought  to  the  court;  and  though  at  first  he  denied  it,  when 
he  had  been  knelt  on  chains  and  vigorously  bambooed  to  as- 
sist his  memory,  his  story  was  found  to  coincide  exactly  with 
what  the  widow  had  said.  He  pleaded  complete  immunity 
from  punishment;  for  he  said  that  when  he  had  delivered 
the  washing,  the  unknown  woman,  whom  he  had  taken  for 
a  domestic  slave,  had  forced  him  to  his  rash  act,  and  he  was 
therefore  innocent. 

"In  spite  of  the  relatives'  protests,  in  the  face  of  this  evi- 
dence nothing  remained  but  to  discharge  the  guilty  pair. 
The  son  soon  sold  most  of  the  property  and  the  couple  dis- 
appeared, and  to-day,  two  years  after  these  events,  the  true 
story  has  come  out." 

Captain  Emm  finished  as  precisely  as  he  had  begun.  He 
uncrossed  his  legs,  rose,  went  to  the  bell,  and  rang  for  some- 
thing to  drink. 

"That  is  a  most  remarkable  story,"  commented  Kerr,  who 
had  been  thoroughly  interested.  "Is  it  really  true?  It  is 
indeed  one  of  the  most  remarkable  stories  I  ever  heard," 


4o6  THE   HUMAN    COBWEB 

"I  am  sure  it  is  true,"  said  Captain  Emm.  He  hesitated  a 
moment  and  looked  almost  abashed.  "It  is  so  true,"  he 
ended,  "that  I  had  interested  myself  in  writing  it  down." 

"Oh-ho,"  exclaimed  Kerr  laughingly,  "I  had  no  idea  you 
were  an  author." 

An  immense  change  came  over  Captain  Emm.  He  looked 
almost  frightened  and  his  little  eyes  blinked  fast. 

"An  author!"  he  exclaimed.  "What  are  you  saying? 
Never  say  such  a  thing  to  anybody.  Never,  please!  I  only 
write  for  my  own  amusement — to  practise  my  English.  I 
should  be  ruined  if  people  thought  I  were  an  author.  Oh, 
yes,  ruined!" 

So  great  was  his  concern  that  he  ceased  being  comical — he 
was  really  frightened. 

"I  should  not  dream  of  telling  anybody,"  said  Kerr  reas- 
suringly. "But  frankly,  I  do  not  exactly  see  why  you  should 
not  write  if  it  pleases  you." 

Captain  Emm  appeared  a  little  reassured. 

"An  officer,"  he  announced  in  his  old  manner,  "should  never 
write:  it  excites  suspicion." 

Then  he  gave  Kerr  his  whisky,  and  drank  a  little  soda- 
water  himself. 

"It  is  time  to  sleep,"  he  announced,  looking  at  his  watch. 

"Good-night,"  said  Kerr,  beginning  to  walk  away. 

But  suddenly  Captain  Emm  began  to  cough  violently  in  a 
most  curious  way.  Involuntarily  Kerr  turned,  and  as  he 
caught  sight  of  his  companion  he  was  overcome  with  amaze- 
ment. 

Captain  Emm's  horselike  face  was  now  crimson-red — so 
red,  in  fact,  that  his  features  looked  swollen  and  convulsed. 
The  big  moustache,  instead  of  being  spread  reposefully  and 
solemnly  across  his  cheeks,  had  become  agitated,  alarmed — 
was  unwittingly  expressing  by  its  fierce  disarray  a  world  of 
troubled  meaning. 

"Drink  some  water,"  suggested  Kerr  from  the  door. 

But  his  companion,  in  spite  of  his  distress,  stolidly  shook 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  407 

his  head.  Though  he  carefully  kept  his  lips  compressed  and 
his  cheeks  absurdly  blown  out  as  if  he  were  going  to  ex- 
plode, it  was  plain  that  he  had  already  control  of  himself. 
Now,  with  a  resolute  movement,  he  suddenly  wheeled  as  if 
on  parade,  and  marching  to  a  chest  of  drawers  he  abruptly 
took  therefrom  a  bundle  of  papers  tied  with  blue  ribbon.  A 
feeling  of  apprehension  smote  Kerr  as  this  strange  man  ap- 
proached him ;  but  he  did  not  stir  an  inch  or  speak  a  word. 

"I  am  doing  a  questionable  act,"  began  Captain  Emm,  now 
speaking  with  all  his  customary  lugubriousness,  "but  I  have 
thought  over  the  matter  well  and  believe  that  I  am  right. 
I  must  first  explain  that  noticing  this  afternoon  that  I  had 
not  in  my  room  a  piece  of  furniture  to  which  I  am  entitled 
— a  chest  of  drawers — I  went  across  the  hall  to  the  empty 
room  which  is  on  the  same  verandah  as  yours."  For  an  al- 
most imperceptible  moment  Captain  Emm  paused  to  bestow 
a  look  on  Kerr's  iron  calm.  "That  chest  of  drawers  hap- 
pened to  be  in  there,  so  I  ordered  it  to  be  brought  to  my 
room.  This  evening  I  discovered  that  one  of  the  lower  draw- 
ers was  locked  and  that  the  key  was  nowhere  to  be  found. 
Fortunately,  before  I  had  called  a  servant,  I  remembered 
that  we  are  in  a  land  where  carpenters  are  lazy.  I  was  al- 
most certain  that  in  this  piece  of  native-made  furniture  there 
would  be  no  such  thing  as  a  wooden  division  between  each 
layer  of  drawers.  So  I  merely  pulled  out  the  drawer  imme- 
diately above  the  one  that  was  locked,  put  down  my  hand, 
and  caught  hold  of  these."  Captain  Emm  stopped  and 
awkwardly  held  up  the  bundle  as  if  it  were  a  lighted  torch. 
Then  he  went  on:  "The  top  one  happens  to  be  yours,  so  I 
did  not  read  it.  The  other  letters  mostly  come  from  Brus- 
sels and  were  addressed  to  the  lady."  Once  more  he  became 
red  and  his  cough  was  with  difficulty  controlled.  "I  have 
only  glanced  at  them,  but  I  have  seen  enough  to  know  that 
they  are  full  of  business  which  concerns  you  most  intimately. 
Now,  good-night." 

Before  Kerr  could  utter  a  word,  Captain  Emm  had  roughly 


4o8  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

thrust  the  packet  into  his  hands  and  as  roughly  closed  and 
locked  his  door. 

In  his  own  room  Kerr  threw  himself  into  a  chair  and  sat 
transfixed  as  he  gradually  understood  the  purport  of  this 
strange  discovery.  For  the  whole  thing  was  clear  now — as 
clear  as  it  would  ever  be.  The  miserable  fiasco  in  which  he 
had  been  the  central  figure  stood  explained,  and  he  saw  down 
long  winding  avenues  which  led  to  nowhere  save  to  dismal 
morasses.  Fear,  cupidity,  jealousy,  passion — each  had  evi- 
dently played  its  part  with  Madame  Boisragon.  Under  her 
cold  exterior  a  problem  highly  complicated  in  its  nature  had 
been  slowly  and  silently  worked  out  because — because  he 
was  not  like  Lorenzo,  a  man  who  saw  danger  when  he  was 
scheming  in  the  very  barking  of  every  stray  dog.  This 
woman  whom  he  had  almost  loved  had  even  taken  away  that 
curious  little  letter  of  Phyllis  May's — and  hidden  it.  And 
all  these  many  other  letters  from  Brussels,  always  signed 
by  the  same  man  Maes?  His  was  evidently  the  master-hand 
— yes,  as  even  the  husband  referred  to  him  respectfully  as 
Colonel  Maes.  .  .  .  And  now  Peter  Kerr  gave  way  to 
fierce  laughter  as  he  understood  the  role  Mrs.  John  West 
had  played — Mrs.  John  West,  whose  existence  he  had  al- 
most forgotten!  Listen  to  what  she  said  about  him — who 
would  have  thought  it?  Well,  what  did  it  matter  now — 
what  did  anything  matter  ?  He  passed  his  hand  over  his  eyes 
and  thought.  That  was  the  worst  part  now — the  thought 
that  this  cold  Madame  Boisragon  had  loved  him  to  order. 
That  was  the  worst  part — it  entered  like  iron  into  his  soul. 
Yet  it  was  true;  it  was  undoubtedly  true.  He  remembered 
once  more  how  curious  had  been  her  attitude  towards  him 
from  the  beginning — how  something  had  seemed  to  sway  her 
first  one  way  and  then  another — how  she  had  repulsed  him 
only  to  surrender  herself.  Of  course  it  was  very  clear  now 
— everything  was  clear. 

He  gazed  at  the  ceiling  and  suddenly  recollected  with  as- 
tonishment that  he  had  no  right,  no  business  to  be  reading 


THE  HUMAN  COBWEB  409 

these  letters.  It  was  only  making  matters  worse.  A  flush 
suffused  his  face  and  he  abruptly  arose.  Lorenzo  was  right 
once  more — an  old  pack  of  cards  is  only  fit  to  be  thrown 
away — especially  when  they  are  marked.  Now  resolutely 
he  tied  up  the  letters  before  he  had  begun  to  exhaust  their 
many  meanings,  and  thrusting  them  into  a  drawer,  he  pre- 
pared to  sleep.  To-morrow  he  would  burn  them;  for  what 
was  the  use  of  reopening  a  tragic  book  across  which  the  finger 
of  Fate  had  written  Finis? 

Yet  that  night,  because  the  very  best  resolutions,  like  all 
other  resolutions,  are  very  fluid  and  ethereal  things  that  float 
up  into  the  air  like  tiny  cloud-puffs  and  are  quickly  dis- 
solved, he  did  not  really  sleep.  All  night  long  a  phantas- 
magoria in  which  Madame  Boisragon,  Mrs.  John  West,  and 
Phyllis  May,  led  by  the  unknown  Belgian  Colonel,  formed 
a  confused  and  hateful  medley,  stood  dancing  endlessly  be- 
fore him  in  high  glee  and  torturing  him  in  a  hundred  ways. 

And  behind  this  phantasmagoria — dominating  it,  towering 
over  it,  yet  mournfully  surveying  it  in  high  embarrassment 
because  of  his  simple  nature,  stood  a  Gargantuan  Captain 
Emm — a  Gargantuan  creature  telling  him  strange  stories  in 
a  hoarse  whisper  under  cover  of  a  vast  and  formidable  mous- 
tache; and — strangest  thing  of  all — showing  him  with  his 
cough  just  how  to  read  the  moral! 


CHAPTER  III 

"Jugez  un  homme  par  ses  questions,  plutot  quc 
par  ses  reponses." — French  Proverb. 

IN  olden  times  in  Europe  the  house  of  every  important 
man  was  truly  his  castle.  There  was  therefore  considerable 
difficulty  in  entering  such  abodes — if  the  owner  did  not  hap- 
pen to  be  in  the  mood  for  receiving  visitors.  For  even  sup- 
posing there  were  no  drawbridges  (as  there  never  were,  save 
in  the  country),  there  existed  other  impediments,  such  as 
rude  serving-folk  and  possibly  hounds  on  chains.  These 
served  to  give  endless  possibilities  to  the  amenities  which 
might  ensue  if  strangers  tried  to  force  their  presence  on  the 
master  of  the  house.  Modern  conditions,  however,  have  en- 
tirely removed  all  such  picturesque  features,  and  now  Eu- 
rope in  the  main  merely  consists  of  masses  of  individuals  duly 
guarded  by  policemen. 

In  China,  however,  even  to-day  the  residence  of  the  big 
man  is  still  his  castle.  The  formidable  nature  of  his  com- 
pound-walls, which  are  always  two  or  three  feet  thick  and 
often  fifteen  feet  high,  makes  them  capable  of  sustaining  an 
arduous  siege;  his  servants  are  numbered  by  the  dozen  if 
not  by  the  hundred;  the  gate-house  is  always  a  veritable 
blockhouse,  and  the  gatemen  blockheads  thoroughly  drilled 
in  the  gentle  art  of  blockading  undesired  visitors.  Also  it 
has  to  be  noted  that  a  curious  system  of  intelligence  passes 
word  from  the  dwelling-house  to  the  gate-house  keepers 
(who  have  their  brothers  and  their  wives'  brothers  and  other 
people's  brothers  to  assist  them)  and  allows  these  guardians 
always  to  know  just  who  may  be  included  in  the  category  of 
personal  grata  and  who  not.  Yesterday's  greatest  friends 
can  very  easily  become  during  the  night  to-day's  enemies — 
and  the  gate-keepers  know  it;  whilst  the  man  whom  they 


THE  HUMAN  COBWEB  411 

literally  spurned  away  at  one  moment  with  most  fatuous  ex- 
cuses may  be  suddenly  most  affably  received.  The  China 
gate-house,  to  perform  such  manifold  duties,  is  provided  with 
various  kinds  of  record-books,  in  which  are  recorded  all  pos- 
sible details.  Thus  visitors'  names  are  always  entered;  lists 
are  kept  of  letters  received  and  letters  sent;  and  there  are 
also  odd  memoranda-books  in  which  are  entered  many  curi- 
ous sums,  large  and  small — not  to  speak  of  other  things. 

Thus  this  important  adjunct  to  the  great  man's  establish- 
ment becomes  virtually  his  clearing-house,  saving  him  from 
endless  trouble.  The  head  gate-keeper,  the  responsible  man, 
being  so  important  inevitably  has  official  rank  and  is  a  per- 
son to  be  considered.  No  back  doors  enter  a  compound — no 
matter  what  number  of  private  entrances  there  may  be  in- 
side— and  the  outer  gate-house,  which  is  so  closely  guarded, 
always  has  first  to  be  passed  before  the  freedom  of  the  com- 
pound is  accorded  to  any  one.  All  day  long,  under  the 
watchful  eyes  of  the  gate-keepers,  a  ceaseless  stream  of  peo- 
ple pass  in  and  out,  beginning  with  humble  and  hard-work- 
ing water-coolies,  who  carry  water  from  the  wells  as  soon 
as  pale  dawn  has  come,  and  ending  perhaps  with  the  passage 
of  Ministers  of  State  or  Imperial  eunuchs,  who  twist  be- 
tween their  supple  fingers  the  destinies  of  provinces.  This 
sub-science  of  Oriental  life,  though  somewhat  puzzling,  is 
very  necessary  to  understand  if  you  would  gain  the  true  per- 
spective, and  it  is  therefore  only  proper  that  it  should  be 
here  explained. 

Kerr,  having  reflected  for  several  days  on  what  his  strange 
new  acquaintance,  Captain  Emm,  had  told  him,  and  having 
ascertained  that  all  political  matters  were  virtually  at  a 
standstill  in  the  capital  owing  to  the  dramatic  coup  d'etat  of 
the  old  Empress  Dowager,  deemed  the  time  propitious  for 
attempting  the  rough  experiment  which  had  been  suggested. 
He  determined  that  he  would  see  the  Prince  that  very  day 
— at  least,  he  would  make  a  vigorous  attempt  to  see  him. 
He  was  fortified  in  his  resolve  by  a  piece  of  paper  Captain 
Emm  had  given  him — the  morning  after  he  had  regaled  him 


412  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

with  the  strange  story  of  Chinese  connubial  felicity.  On 
this  bit  of  paper  were  merely  written  a  few  Chinese  charac- 
ters; yet  Captain  Emm  had  told  him  that,  put  in  a  plain  en- 
velope and  tightly  sealed,  this  talisman  must  have  at  once  a 
most  beneficent  effect  on  the  Prince. 

Accordingly,  having  duly  made  up  his  mind,  Kerr  merely 
summoned  his  two  interpreters  and  informed  them  that  at 
two  o'clock  that  day  he  would  call  on  the  Prince.  The  in- 
terpreters suggested  that  the  proper  course  would  be  to  send 
some  one  first  to  ascertain  if  such  an  interview  would  be  con- 
venient: they  were  astonished  to  find  that  their  proposal  was 
quickly  brushed  aside  by  their  employer,  who  curtly  told 
them  that  their  duty  was  merely  to  obey  and  not  to  advise. 

Two  o'clock,  therefore,  found  the  little  party  once  more 
at  the  Prince's  gates.  The  interpreters,  carrying  out  the  in- 
structions which  had  been  carefully  given  them,  proceeded 
to  the  gate-house  with  their  master's  English  and  Chinese 
cards,  and  nothing  more.  Kerr  remained  sitting  in  his  cart, 
smoking  a  cigarette  and  trying  to  look  dignified  and  uncon- 
cerned in  spite  of  the  crowd  of  curious  faces,  furnished  with 
gimlet  eyes,  which  quickly  surrounded  him. 

He  was  not  very  much  disappointed  when  after  a  quarter 
of  an  hour's  delay  the  interpreters  returned,  and  said  that 
the  Prince  regretted  deeply  that  as  he  was  suffering  se- 
verely from  sickness,  he  must  postpone  the  pleasure  of  seeing 
his  distinguished  caller.  They  had  sent  in  two  messages 
through  the  gate-keepers,  they  said — the  same  answer  had 
come  each  time.  As  if  to  show  how  futile  was  this  flowery 
excuse,  half  a  dozen  personages  in  official  clothes  just  then 
came  out,  and  jumping  into  their  carts,  drove  off  hurriedly. 

"The  doctors,  I  suppose,"  remarked  Kerr  caustically,  point- 
ing to  these  departures.  The  interpreters  in  spite  of  them- 
selves broke  into  nervous  smiles.  They  did  not  like  the  new 
spirit  of  independence  which  infected  their  employer ;  and  not 
understanding  to  what  it  was  due,  they  suspected  that  some- 
thing was  going  to  surprise  them.  It  was. 

Kerr  was  meanwhile  searching  in  his  pocket.     The  crowd 


THE   HUMAN    COBWEB  413 

of  busybodies,  now  vastly  swelled  in  numbers,  almost  tum- 
bled over  one  another  in  their  anxiety  to  know  what  possibly 
could  be  in  that  pocket.  Kerr,  though  he  had  the  envelope 
between  his  ringers,  purposely  kept  a  long  while  searching. 
He  believed  he  had  the  situation  well  in  hand  now,  and  he 
was  enjoying  himself.  The  interpreters'  anxiety  had  become 
unbounded,  and  it  was  very  diverting  to  him  to  observe  it. 

At  length  the  hand  brought  forth  the  secret.  It  was  merely 
an  envelope — a  big  envelope,  purposely  selected  on  account 
of  its  size,  and  heavily  sealed. 

Kerr  spoke  slowly. 

"You  will  take  this  envelope,"  he  said,  "and  hand  it  to  the 
gate-keeper.  The  gate-keeper  is  to  deliver  it  at  once  to  the 
Prince  and  is  then  to  return  with  any  message  there  may  be. 
Do  you  understand  ?  Nothing  more." 

The  senior  of  the  two  interpreters  received  the  cover  and 
his  supple  fingers  passed  like  lightning  up  and  down  the  white 
paper.  What  was  in  it?  Could  it  be  money?  If  so,  this 
method  was  a  little  too  brutal  even  for 

"I  beg  your  pardon,  sir,"  he  said  in  his  perfect  English, 
"but  I  would  like  to  remark " 

"Nothing,  if  you  are  well  advised,"  interruped  Kerr  with 
sudden  roughness.  "You  have  your  orders:  execute  them 
and  make  no  remarks  at  all." 

The  two  men  went  off  again,  talking  rapidly  to  each  other. 
They  were  devoured  by  curiosity.  What  may  have  hap- 
pened inside  the  Prince's  residence  was  never  known  to  Kerr  ; 
but  after  not  more  than  ten  minutes  the  interpreters  sud- 
denly returned.  A  new  respect  had  crept  into  the  manner 
of  the  two  men — the  respect  which  is  accorded  by  all  Orien- 
tals to  unexpected  success. 

"The  Prince  says  that  he  will  do  himself  the  honour  of 
making  the  effort  of  seeing  you.  Please  come." 

"With  the  greatest  alacrity  and  good  feeling,"  Kerr  re- 
plied. 

He  jumped  to  the  ground  so  hastily  that  the  bystanders  fell 
back  on  one  another,  as  if  to  escape  any  possible  chastise- 


4H  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

ment  for  their  bad  manners.  Kerr,  however,  did  not  even 
see  them  now.  He  threw  away  his  cigarette  and  addressed 
a  last  remark  to  his  own  men. 

"If  you  ever  have  to  call  on  a  Prince  with  a  bad  sickness," 
he  said,  smiling  amiably,  since  he  had  won  his  point,  "always 
be  sure  to  have  a  headache  powder  in  your  pocket." 

And  with  that  parting  shot  he  left  them  to  cudgel  their 
brains  during  the  whole  of  the  interview  regarding  what  that 
envelope  could  really  have  contained. 

The  Prince  undoubtedly  must  have  been  a  trifle  unwell — 
in  a  physical  as  well  as  a  political  sense — for  he  looked  pale 
and  worried,  and  his  politeness  was  not  sufficient  to  keep 
him  as  interested  as  he  should  have  been. 

"Did  this  gentleman  ever  discover  how  his  papers  were 
robbed?"  he  began,  seeking  to  undermine  the  new  assurance 
which  he  speedily  discovered  in  Kerr's  manner  by  bringing 
up  the  most  disagreeable  subject  he  could  think  of. 

"No,"  answered  the  interpreters  after  a  look  from  Kerr. 

"It  was  singularly,  unfortunate,"  said  the  Prince,  a  trifle 
nervously  now.  His  visitor  remained  so  calm  and  indiffer- 
ent that  he  did  not  like  the  outlook,  especially  as  the  little 
scrap  of  paper  had  said  that  he  was  a  friend  of  a  new  great 
man  who  had  arisen. 

"Singularly  unfortunate,"  acquiesced  Kerr,  readily  enough. 

"It  should  never  have  happened,"  continued  the  Prince. 

"Undoubtedly  you  are  right,"  confessed  Kerr. 

"I  have  never  heard  of  such  a  thing  before,"  said  his  dis- 
tinguished host. 

"It  is  very  rare,"  admitted  the  caller  once  more. 

The  Prince  was  transparently  glad  when  his  servants,  to 
the  number  of  some  half-dozen  or  more,  just  then  entered 
with  tea  and  cakes  and  cigarettes,  as  well  as  some  sweet 
champagne  in  a  bottle  adorned  with  a  label  made  for  this 
particular  market.  As  the  glasses  looked  even  more  unappe- 
tizing than  the  doubtful  bottle  of  champagne,  Kerr  took  the 
green  tea  which  was  pressed  on  him,  and  scalded  his  lips. 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  415 

This  interview  was  somehow  much  more  interesting  than 
the  others  had  been.  He  was  now  his  own  general — and  he 
liked  the  idea. 

"The  weather  is  becoming  delicious,"  he  remarked,  some- 
what after  the  manner  of  the  grammar-book. 

The  Prince  assented  and  then  continued. 

"Did  you  not  feel  tempted  to  go  away  when  assailed  by  the 
violent  and  unhealthy  heat  of  summer?"  he  inquired. 

Kerr  scalded  his  lips  once  more  in  his  determination  not  to 
show  even  the  trace  of  a  smile.  Yet  the  thrust  was  so  pret- 
tily made  that  it  was  almost  a  sin  not  to  applaud  it.  How- 
ever, he  must  be  firm. 

"No,  I  did  not,"  he  answered  abruptly.    Then  he  went  on. 

"The  English,"  he  remarked  sententiously,  "are  known  all 
over  the  world  for  their  roughness  of  manner  and  tenacity 
of  purpose.  They  are  slow  and  somewhat  stupid  compared 
with  other  peoples ;  but  when  they  grip  a  thing,  they  hold 
on." 

The  interpreters  had  some  difficulty,  as  they  translated,  in 
keeping  a  frown  from  the  Prince's  face.  Openly  he  did  not 
relish  an  allusion  to  a  past  which  he  would  have  liked  to  be 
considered  dead,  buried,  and  forgotten.  However,  he  was  a 
passed  master  in  the  art  of  diplomatic  thrust  and  counter- 
thrust;  and  so  now,  pressing  his  beautifully  shaped  hands 
together,  he  suddenly  accepted  the  situation  and  philosophic- 
ally smiled. 

"I  do  not  think  the  English  are  slow  and  stupid  when  their 
interests  are  concerned,"  he  replied. 

"Really?"  said  Kerr,  as  if  he  were  falling  into  a  trap  and 
allowing  himself  to  be  gently  turned  from  a  set  purpose. 

The  Prince  continued: 

"The  English  understand  commerce  very  well.  No  stupid 
people  understand  trade:  at  least  they  lose  money.  There- 
fore the  English,  since  they  make  money,  cannot  be  stupid." 

Kerr  set  down  his  delicate  porcelain  cup  suddenly,  and  with 
that  movement  his  whole  manner  changed.  Now  was  the 
time. 


416  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

"You  are  right,"  he  said  with  extraordinary  earnestness. 
"The  English  cannot  lose  money — they  will  not  lose  money 
without  a  fight.  I  am  glad  you  understand.  They  cannot 
lose  money." 

Bang,  bang,  bang!  He  brought  his  fist  down  so  heavily 
three  times  on  the  Canton  blackwood  table  at  his  side  that 
his  tea-cup  jumped.  And  as  the  tea-cup  jumped  so  did  the 
Prince  jump  and  the  interpreters  jump.  It  was  delightful. 
He  was  reverting  to  the  historic  methods  of  Sir  Harry 
Parkes  and  becoming  a  mere  table-thumper  as  necessity  de- 
manded. 

"Oh!"  said  the  Prince,  sitting  forward  on  the  edge  of  his 
chair. 

"Oh,  oh!"  echoed  the  interpreters  involuntarily,  as  if  they 
were  interpreting. 

Kerr  bit  his  lips  with  such  force  that  he  himself  started. 
Captain  Emm's  medicine,  after  the  headache  powder,  was 
a  splendid  tonic  evidently. 

"Yes,"  he  continued  aloud.  "I  am  like  my  countrymen: 
I  cannot  lose  money." 

"That  is  so,  that  is  so,"  assented  the  Prince  somewhat  hur- 
riedly, carefully  watching  his  visitor's  hands.  "That  is  com- 
mon sense  which  every  one  understands." 

"I  am  glad  every  one  understands,"  said  Kerr. 

The  interpreters  looked  at  each  other  in  doubt  and  then 
at  Kerr.  They  had  not  translated  this  last  remark.  The 
Prince  was  looking  at  them  inquiringly. 

"Tell  the  Prince,"  repeated  Kerr  sternly,  "that  I  am  glad 
every  one  understands." 

It  was  so  pointed  that  even  the  Prince's  pale  and  aristo- 
cratic face  showed  traces  of  sudden  colour;  and  as  that  col- 
our receded  matters  took  on  a  new  aspect. 

"What  new  plans  has  this  gentleman?"  asked  the  Prince 
in  a  businesslike  voice.  Diplomacy  was  plainly  at  an  end: 
neither  thrust  nor  counter-thrust  had  been  of  any  use.  It 
was  time  to  be  plain. 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  417 

Kerr  smiled  gently  and  put  his  hands  into  his  coat-pockets. 
He  would  hammer  the  table  no  more,  if  things  were  going 
as  smoothly  as  this.  Also  he  would  like  the  Prince  to 
know  it. 

"It  is  imperative  for  the  Prince  to  understand  certain  plain 
facts,"  he  said  aloud.  "I  have  spent  more  than  twenty  thou- 
sand pounds  in  China  and  have  had  nothing  in  return.  My 
costs  must  be  recovered  somehow,  or  else  I  cannot  return 
home." 

"Twenty  thousand  pounds,"  said  the  Prince,  looking  puz- 
zled; "where  have  you  spent  so  much  money?" 

It  was  audacious  of  him,  and  Kerr  appreciated  it.  The  dig- 
nitary was  determined  to  find  out,  if  possible,  the  names  of 
the  others  who  had  profited  in  the  same  way  as  himself.  But 
Kerr  had  no  intention  of  obliging  him. 

"It  is  unimportant,"  replied  Kerr  meaningly.  "I  have  all 
details  carefully  entered,  and  my  cheque-book  affords  clear 
proof." 

"Oh!"  said  the  Prince  blandly.  "Now  let  us  talk  busi- 
ness." 

They  did  talk  business — clearly  and  straight  to  the  point 
for  one  hour  without  interruption ;  and  when  Kerr  got  up  to 
go,  he  felt  convinced  that  the  Prince  and  he  understood  each 
other  as  they  never  had  before.  They  came  to  a  hard-and- 
fast  arrangement  which  could  not  fail  to  be  profitable  to  both 
of  them;  for  with  the  question  of  commissions  definitely  ar- 
ranged, there  would  be  no  more  bungling. 

The  gate-house  reflected  these  sentiments  as  Kerr  handed 
out  some  dollar-notes  for  distribution.  Peace  and  good  will 
had  come.  .  .  . 

Kerr  did  not  see  Captain  Emm  again  until  that  evening, 
when  he  was  sitting  as  usual  at  his  little  table  writing. 

"Well?"  said  Captain  Emm  inquiringly,  stopping  his  work 
for  a  few  minutes. 

"I  have  to  thank  you  for  a  lot,"  replied  Kerr,  laughingly 


4i8  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

telling  him  of  his  experiences.  Captain  Emm  listened  to  it 
all  very  gravely,  though  once  or  twice  the  horse-face  relaxed 
and  the  little  eyes  twinkled  fast. 

"Good,"  he  said  finally;  "I  am  very  pleased." 

"I  don't  like  to  ask  questions,"  ventured  Kerr  as  he  was 
leaving,  "but  I  am  curious  about  what  may  have  been  writ- 
ten on  that  little  piece  of  paper  you  gave  me." 

Captain  Emm  hesitated  and  then  spoke. 

"I  can  tell  you,"  he  said,  "but  only  in  a  certain  way.  On 
that  paper  was  written  that  you  are  a  friend  of  the  man  who 
may  become  dictator  of  China." 

Kerr  was  wise  enough  not  to  ask  the  name  of  this  person- 
age :  doubtless  he  would  be  able  to  learn  that  later. 

This  indeed  was  the  land  of  mystery  and  intrigue,  thought 
he,  as  he  peacefully  fell  asleep. 


CHAPTER  IV 

"II  en  est  du  veritable  amour  comrae  de  1'appa- 
rition  des  esprits:  tout  le  monde  en  parle,  mais 
peu  de  gens  en  ont  vu." — LA  ROCHEFOUCAULD. 

THE  autumn  day  had  been  beautiful  beyond  words.  Not  a 
cloud  was  in  the  sky — not  a  breath  of  ill-conditioned  wind 
disturbed  the  perfect  serenity  of  satisfied  nature.  The  hills 
and  mountains  of  Mongolia  seemed  to  have  suddenly  come 
many  miles  nearer;  for  in  that  clear  atmosphere  distances 
were  annihilated  and  the  eye  seemed  capable  of  piercing  end- 
less space.  So  like  dry  champagne  was  the  air,  too,  that  all 
living  things  suddenly  acquired  a  new  zest  for  living,  which 
they  showed  in  their  joyous  movements.  Ponies  and  mules, 
hauling  at  their,  hempen  traces,  whenever  their  drivers 
brought  them  to  a  halt  on  the  rutted  highway,  now  play- 
fully bit  at  one  another  and  reared  and  kicked  until  they 
were  hoarsely  reproved — in  strange  contrast  to  the  dull 
lethargy  of  the  recent  summer  days,  when,  gasping  for  breath 
and  soaking  in  sweat,  they  were  allowed  a  few  minutes* 
respite  under  the  doubtful  shade  of  shrivelled  trees  to  ease 
their  aching  limbs.  Dogs  barked  to-day  at  the  passing  stran- 
ger more  from  habit  than  from  anger:  they  appeared  much 
more  interested  in  trotting  far  and  wide  in  compact  and 
friendly  little  bands,  investigating  with  renewed  interest  the 
familiar  countryside.  In  the  little  mud  villages  the  ugly 
black  pigs  grunted  and  the  cocks  crowed  and  the  hens  clacked 
as  if  all  the  world  were  young  once  more  and  no  unhappi- 
ness  possible.  As  for  the  toiling  blue-clad  population,  dis- 
tributed far  and  wide  over  the  fields,  engaged  on  their  vari- 
ous unending  tasks,  they  saluted  Kerr  as  he  passed  with  an 
astounding  cheerfulness.  So  infectious  was  this  jolly  au- 
tumn humour,  that  a  mouse-coloured  donkey  which  had  been 


420  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

rolling  in  utter  contentment  in  the  dust  of  the  highroad,  its 
four  feet  absurdly  in  the  air,  sprang  up  as  it  saw  the  ponies 
canter  by,  and  braying  loudly,  rushed  along  beside  Kerr. 

"Get  back,  you  little  brute,"  said  Kerr,  playing  at  him  with 
the  lash  of  his  hunting-crop  and  trying  to  drive  him  off.  The 
donkey,  however,  nothing  abashed  at  the  appearance  of  such 
a  commonplace  thing  as  a  whip,  only  brayed  all  the  louder, 
and  kicking  up  his  heels,  quickened  his  pace  into  a  frantic 
gallop.  The  spirit  moved  him  to  gallop:  pray  why  should 
not  a  little  beast  of  burden  have  moods  like  every  one  else 
that  brilliant  autumn  day?  So  down  the  winding  highroad 
he  went  galloping  and  kicking  and  braying,  as  if  he  were 
the  herald  of  the  little  party  of  horsemen  bound  for  the 
mighty  capital. 

There  it  was  at  length — the  vast  line  of  grey  walls  looking 
majestic  in  the  yellow  sunlight,  the  lofty  gate-towers  ap- 
pearing as  if  they  had  been  planned  to  gaze  back  into  the  dis- 
tant Past.  Kerr  and  his  men  instinctively  shook  up  their 
ponies  and  took  the  last  mile  or  two  of  brown  highroad  at  a 
plunging  pace.  It  was  rather  good  to  return  home  after  a 
long  day  in  the  country — a  day  mainly  spent  in  meander- 
ing here  and  there  and  idly  gazing  at  blue  figures  nimbly 
climbing  trees  and  stripping  therefrom  rich  yellow  persim- 
mons, which  were  piled  high  in  great  brown  wicker  baskets, 
making  offerings  fit  for  the  gods.  Also  things  were  going 
much  better  for  Kerr.  The  slow  weeks  which  had  gone  by 
had  healed  his  hurt,  had  made  him  forget  the  things  he 
wished  to  forget,  and  now  much  had  become  only  a  distant 
memory.  The  Prince  was  also  acting  up  to  the  spirit  of  his 
agreement;  and  it  was  now  merely  a  question  of  time  for 
something  satisfactory  to  materialize.  So  he  and  his  men 
swept  through  the  northern  city  gate,  their  clothes  dust- 
laden,  their  faces  red-bronze  from  much  sun  and  open  air,  in 
much  the  same  joyousness  as  they  had  found  about  them  dur- 
ing the  day. 

Fate  willed  that  Kerr  should  take  one  turning  instead  of 
another;  and  so,  trotting  quickly  in  spite  of  the  city  traffic, 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  421 

he  came  at  length  to  a  thick  concourse  of  people  gathered 
round  the  massive  gates  of  a  temple.  The  Manchu  women 
were  there  in  great  numbers  in  gala  dress — their  painted 
faces  and  their  brilliant  silken  coats  and  waistcoats  making 
a  superb  mass  of  colour  as  they  streamed  through  the  red 
gates  in  shy  yet  inquisitive  groups. 

"What  is  it?"  cried  Kerr,  pulling  up  and  turning  in  his 
saddle. 

"Joss-pidgin,"  grunted  his  leading  man  laconically  in  that 
curious  lingua  franca  of  the  Far  East.  The  uncouth  words 
just  then  seemed  to  Kerr  a  rather  inadequate  summary  of 
the  scene.  Suddenly  interested,  he  watched  the  good-natured 
crowd  streaming  in  through  an  entrance  which  was  much 
too  narrow  for  so  many.  Yellow-clad  priests  were  superin- 
tending this  operation;  and  rough  lay-brothers  with  evil 
faces  and  shaven  pates -and  with  heavy  whips  in  their  hands 
were  beating  back  all  boys  and  men  who  strove  to  break 
through  the  line  and  get  away  into  some  forbidden  court- 
yard. 

"This  is  something  new,"  remarked  Kerr  to  himself,  as 
there  was  no  one  else  to  make  conversation  to.  He  looked  at 
his  watch;  then  suddenly  he  made  up  his  mind  and  slipped 
from  his  pony. 

"I'm  going  in,"  he  briefly  announced,  throwing  his  reins 
to  his  men.  "Wait." 

He  joined  the  crowd  and  pressed  forward  with  them.  At 
the  gates  the  yellow-clad  priests  and  the  Mongol  lay-brothers 
in  their  maroon  coats  picked  him  out  just  as  if  he  were  a 
wolf  among  a  flock  of  sheep.  Yet  he  was  the  sheep,  and  they 
the  wolves.  For  a  dozen  hands  were  extended:  there  were 
endless  vociferations — money,  money,  money,  said  hands  and 
voices  in  the  universal  language  of  beg. 

Kerr  dragged  the  needed  coin  from  his  pockets — and  mag- 
ically hands  were  dropped  and  voices  stilled,  whilst  the 
amount  was  carefully  scrutinized  by  gimlet-like  eyes. 

Some  big  ceremony  was  evidently  proceeding  within. 
Rough  wooden  stages  had  been  erected  round  a  vast  court- 


422  THE   HUMAN    COBWEB 

yard,  at  the  end  of  which  stood  an  immense  yellow-tiled 
hall.  These  stages  were  literally  packed  with  women  and 
children,  forming  brilliant  masses  of  variegated  colour  just 
as  if  they  had  been  banks  of  flowers.  As  neither  these  stages 
nor  the  courtyard  itself  sufficed  to  contain  the  multitudes 
which  had  come,  the  women  had  been  allowed  to  invade  pa- 
vilions and  belvederes  in  distant  parts  of  the  temple  grounds. 
Pressed  together  and  looking  out  of  every  casement  and  lat- 
ticed gallery,  there  they  appeared  in  the  golden  sunlight  like 
nosegays  made  of  a  hundred  different  flowers — for  the  col- 
ourings of  their  silks  seemed  endless.  Many  men  and  boys 
had  climbed  the  yellow  roofs  and  trees;  others  were  now 
struggling  to  escalade  walls;  and  so  great  was  the  press  that 
the  strong  cordon  of  priests  round  the  steps  of  the  great  hall 
had  great  difficulty  in  preventing  an  invasion  of  the  very 
temple  altars.  Whips  were  cracked  harshly,  and  voices 
shouted  and  chided  as  if  to  command  silence. 

Suddenly  a  fierce  chorus  of  trumpets  blared  discordantly 
from  within  the  temple  and  the  latticed  doors  were  thrown 
wide  open.  Clouds  of  incense  were  wafted  out,  and  as  the 
murmur  of  the  crowd  was  hushed,  the  monotonous  chanting 
of  a  great  company  of  priests  kneeling  in  lines  within  grad- 
ually rose  louder  and  louder.  In  the  sunlight,  with  all  this 
multitude  watching  respectfully,  it  was  infinitely  impressive. 

It  was  the  first  time  Kerr  had  seen  anything  of  the  sort, 
and  he  marvelled  at  the  orderliness  and  submissiveness  of  the 
congregation  and  the  picturesqueness  of  the  celebration.  It 
came  to  him  all  as  an  odd  surprise,  after  the  fears  which 
every  one  in  the  little  European  colony  had  been  expressing 
for  many  weeks  regarding  the  political  outlook.  Though  he 
was  a  foreigner,  an  unbeliever,  an  infidel,  among  all  this 
vast  believing  throng  there  was  not  a  sign  of  hostility 
towards  him  to  be  seen.  How  different  in  the  political  cir- 
cumstances of  the  day  would  it  have  been  in  any  other 
Asiatic  country!  He  could  see  across  the  courtyard  some 
other  Europeans — there  were  ladies,  too — evidently  this  was 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  423 

a  well-known  festival  day  which  people  came  to  see.  He 
wondered  who  those  ladies 

The  cigarette,  now  smouldering  between  his  fingers,  com- 
pletely forgotten,  suddenly  got  hotter  and  hotter  in  his  hands 
until  it  burnt  him.  He  let  it  drop  with  a  muttered  oath  and 
continued  to  stare  as  if  spell-bound.  He  could  have  sworn 
that  he  was  not  mistaken — it  was  her  figure.  Yes,  by  all 
that  was  miraculous,  he  was  sure  of  it.  She  had  a  way  of 
throwing  up  her  head  which  he  always  remembered.  It 
must  be  she.  Yet  how 

He  began  forcing  his  way  through  the  throng  in  spite  of 
the  protests  and  cries  of  the  people  around  him.  Pushing  one 
man,  pulling  another,  he  managed  gradually  to  lessen  the 
distance  between  himself  and  his  goal.  Once  he  stopped 
quite  still  to  make  absolutely  sure.  Yes,  of  course,  it  was 
she.  The  miraculous  had  happened.  Perhaps  it  was  because 
they  were  within  a  temple — where  miracles  were  always  pos- 
sible. His  ideas  rushed  stormily  through  his  brains. 

His  heart  was  still  beating  tumultuously  when  he  had  ap- 
proached within  speaking  distance.  He  was  now  glad  that 
the  sea  of  heads  still  hid  him.  He  wanted  time  to  think  a 
bit — perhaps  he  would  wait  until  the  thing  was  over,  and 
the  people  began  streaming  out.  Damn! 

For  something  had  caused  Phyllis  to  turn  her  head.  Her 
eyes  had  travelled  quickly  and — the  inevitable  had  hap- 
pened. She  had  seen  him.  Also,  he  noted  that  she  had 
started  in  a  peculiar  way. 

As  mechanically  he  raised  his  hat  and  tried  to  force  his  way 
up  to  the  compound-wall  where  this  little  party  of  Euro- 
pean sightseers  had  taken  their  stand,  he  saw  the  colour  stain 
her  cheeks.  He  waved  his  hand. 

"How  do  you  do,  Mrs.  May?"  he  called,  speaking  dip- 
lomatically to  the  mother.  "I  am  trying  to  fight  my  way." 

Mrs.  May  turned  and  smiled  pleasantly. 

"Why,  it  is  Mr.  Kerr,"  she  exclaimed  a  little  superfluously. 
"How  do  you  do,  Mr.  Kerr — how  are  you?  I  never  ex- 


424  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

pected  to  meet  you  in  here.    Phyllis,  do  you  see  Mr.  Kerr?" 

Kerr  forced  the  last  wedge  of  people  out  of  his  way;  and 
at  last  stood  in  front  of  them  hat  in  hand. 

"Of  all  the  wonderful  things  that  can  happen  in  a  won- 
derful world,"  he  said  in  genuine  tones  of, surprise,  "how  is 
it  that  you  have  got  here — to  Peking?  I  am  overwhelmed." 

He  looked  from  mother  to  daughter  in  open  amazement. 

"Why,"  said  Mrs.  May,  "it  is  really  quite  simple.  We 
got  as  far  as  Japan,  after  having  been  in  Canada,  and  then 
Phyllis  suggested  that  as  we  had  got  as  far  as  that  we  had  bet- 
ter see  China  too." 

"Did  I  say  that?"  said  Phyllis,  who  was  very  much  occu- 
pied in  adjusting  her  veil. 

"We  heard  that  you  were  out  of  town — off  in  the  country," 
continued  Mrs.  May,  for  once  in  her  life  bearing  the  brunt 
of  the  conversation,  "or  else  Phyllis  would  have  sent  you  a 
note." 

"When  did  you  arrive?"  asked  Kerr,  who  had  been  so  ab- 
sorbed in  greeting  them  that  he  had  overlooked  De  Boyar 
and  another  man  who  had  come  as  their  escort. 

"The  day  before  yesterday,"  said  Phyllis  calmly. 

"The  day  before  yesterday,"  repeated  Peter  Kerr  blankly, 
"and  I  never  knew  it!" 

"Poor  man!"  cried  De  Boyar,  coming  into  the  conversa- 
tion. "Look,  how  distressed  he  is!" 

Phyllis  smiled  dazzlingly  at  De  Boyar  and  then  suddenly 
looked  at  Peter  Kerr. 

"He  certainly  looks  a  little  astonished,"  she  remarked  un- 
feelingly, "though  I  can't  see  why.  Everybody  comes  to 
Peking  nowadays." 

"Oh,  no,"  objected  De  Boyar  gallantly,  "only  the  picked 
ones  of  the  world." 

"It  wouldn't  be  so  bad  if  it  were  not  for  those  horrid  little 
coasting-steamers,"  remarked  Mrs.  May,  coming  back  to  the 
commonplace. 

"Did  you  have  a  rough  trip  up  the  coast?"  asked  Kerr. 

"Awful,"  said  both  ladies  in  one  breath. 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  425 

"I  thought  I  should  never  be  able  to  eat  again,"  added 
Phyllis,  "and  I  am  sure  I  got  as  thin  as  .a  stick  in  four  days." 

"You  don't  look  it,  anyway,  if  that  is  any  consolation," 
said  Peter  Kerr,  trying  to  meet  her  eyes. 

"Oh,"  replied  Phyllis  carelessly,  looking  down,  "it  is  this 
grey  dress  which  does  that.  Grey  is  worse  than  yellow — it 
makes  one  twice  as  large  as  one  really  is." 

"Is  that  why  elephants  look  so  big?"  asked  De  Boyar  in 
his  irrepressible  way. 

Everybody  laughed. 

"How  absurd!"  said  Phyllis,  letting  her  eyes  rest  almost 
tenderly  on  the  gay  Russian.  Kerr  gnawed  his  moustache 
and  looked  preternaturally  serious.  His  suspicions  were 
deepening :  there  were  rocks  ahead. 

"Where  have  you  been  to-day,  Mr.  Kerr?"  said  Mrs.  May 
after  an  interval  of  silence  during  which  they  had  watched 
the  temple  front.  Crowds  of  fresh  priests  had  streamed 
into  the  building  chanting  solemnly,  and  the  trumpeting  for 
a  while  had  been  fast  and  furious. 

"Only  out  riding  in  the  country,"  replied  Kerr.  "I  went 
as  far  as  those  western  hills  you  can  see  over  there.  It's  a 
thirty-mile  ride  there  and  back." 

"I  suppose  there  is  a  lot  to  see,"  continued  Mrs.  May,  won- 
dering a  little  why  she  had  to  make  so  much  conversation  to- 
day. 

"Yes,"  agreed  Kerr,  "there  is  any  amount  of  sight  and 
trips." 

"Peking  must  be  very  interesting,"  remarked  Phyllis  mean- 
ingly. She  gazed  past  Peter  Kerr  at  the  crowd  behind  in  the 
way  that  women  have  when  they  wish  to  mark  their  point. 

"You  have  found  out  very  soon,"  he  remarked  ironically, 
trying  to  catch  her  eye,  and  stifling  his  wrath. 

"That  does  not  exactly  require  a  person  of  genius  to  dis- 
cover," retorted  Phyllis  just  as  ironically.  He  bit  his  lip.  He 
might  have  known  from  the  beginning. 

"I  hope  we  shall  be  able  to  see  everything  in  the  short  time 
we  have,"  continued  Phyllis  calmly. 


426  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

"A  short  time!"  cried  De  Boyar,  breaking  once  more  into 
the  conversation  and  casting  his  eyes  up  to  heaven  and  clasp- 
ing his  hands  together  melodramatically.  "You  dare  to  talk 
of  going  when  you  have  just  arrived!  Miss  May,  you  have 
no  heart." 

Phyllis  laughed  and  studied  the  eccentric  Russian  with  eyes 
which  purposely  softened. 

"Oh,  yes,"  she  said.  "I  have  a  heart,  I  assure  you — but  I 
like  to  be  persuaded." 

"Then  there  is  hope,"  returned  De  Boyar  fervently.  "We 
must  all  combine  to  persuade  her.  Kerr,  I  count  on  you, 
since  you  are  an  old  friend.  Come,  let  me  hear  you  begin." 

There  was  more  than  a  soupgon  of  deviltry  in  De  Boyar's 
manner.  He  was  as  quick  as  chain-lightning.  Already  he 
had  understood  that  an  unrehearsed  little  comedy  was  pro- 
ceeding between  this  young  Englishwoman  who  amused  him, 
and  the  Englishman  whom  he  did  not  completely  understand. 

"I  am  afraid  I  am  not  much  good  at  persuading,"  said 
Kerr  in  a  penitent  way,  hoping  that  his  passage-at-arms  with 
Phyllis  was  over. 

"Bosh!"  said  Phyllis  under  her  breath,  but  still  just  loud 
enough  for  him  to  hear.  Kerr  winced.  De  Boyar  was 
explaining  something  volubly  to  the  others. 

"You  could  always  stab  deep  with  a  monosyllable,"  he 
replied,  seizing  the  opportunity,  "but  you  used  to  have  more 
mercy." 

"I  am  sorry  I  have  deteriorated,"  said  the  lady  rather 
stiffly,  conscious  of  the  subtle  advantage  she  had  already 
gained. 

She  leant  against  the  wall  and  a  minute  passed  in  silence. 
Purposely  she  gave  her  undivided  attention  to  the  hoarse 
flaring  trumpets  which  had  recommenced  their  strange 
music — and  so  the  opportunity  for  continuing  the  little 
duel  was  lost. 

"What  wonderful  barbarism,"  she  said  at  length  to  De 
Boyar,  pointing  towards  the  temple  doors  and  the  yellow- 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  427 

clad  priests.  "It  makes  my  blood  run  cold  when  they  make 
that  noise." 

"Yes,"  said  old  Mrs.  May,  actually  shivering.  "I  should 
be  very  afraid  to  be  here  alone  with  you,  Phyllis  dear." 

She  put  out  her  hand  and  took  the  girl  by  the  arm. 
Phyllis  patted  her  reassuringly. 

"We  have  Mr.  Kerr  to  protect  us  now,"  she  said  a  little 
maliciously.  "He  has  a  great  deal  of  experience." 

"Somebody  important  is  arriving,"  cried  De  Boyar,  stand- 
ing on  the  tips  of  his  toes. 

The  crowd  gave  way,  and  to  Kerr's  immense  surprise,  he 
saw,  preceded  by  a  number  of  officials,  his  Prince.  The 
Prince  went  up  the  temple  steps  and  fell  on  his  knees. 

"By  Jove!"  murmured  Kerr. 

"What  is  it?"  inquired  De  Boyar. 

Kerr  shook  his  head. 

"Nothing — nothing.  Only  I  know  that  old  fellow." 

"Do  you  really,  now?"  said  Mrs.  May,  highly  interested 
when  she  heard  that  he  was  a  Prince.  "Phyllis  was  saying 
on  the  steamer  that  she  would  like  you  to  get  her  taken  into 
some  palace  to  see  how  the  great  people  live  here." 

A  smile  trembled  on  Kerr's  lips  and  he  rejoiced  inwardly. 

"I  hope  you  haven't  changed  your  mind  since  the  steamer, 
Miss  May,"  he  said  genially. 

Phyllis  did  not  think  it  necessary  to  answer  just  then  save 
with  an  indignant  look. 

The  ceremony  finally  came  to  an  end;  and  as  they  made 
their  way  to  the  temple  gates  the  party  became  a  little  sep- 
arated. It  was  perhaps  not  entirely  chance  which  made 
Phyllis  lag  behind  until  she  was  alone  with  Kerr. 

"You  will  want  to  hear  all  about  your  friends,  I  suppose," 
she  said,  "as  soon  as  you  can  come  round  and  see  us." 

"Of  course,"  assented  Kerr  cautiously,  not  yet  sure  whether 
her  mopd  had  changed.  "How  is  Barker?" 

"Sir  James  was  very  well  when  we  left  two  months  ago," 


428  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

replied  Phyllis,  "though  rather  worried,  I  think,  about 
things  out  here." 

She  began  telling  how  he  had  come  to  see  her  several  times. 

"All  sorts  of  people  were  wondering  if  you  were  returning 
home,"  she  continued  presently.  "Mrs.  John  West  was 
frantic  with  Sir  James  one  day  about  you."  She  shot  a 
glance  at  him  with  the  rapidity  of  lightning. 

"Damn!"  muttered  Kerr  crossly. 

"Did  you  speak?"  asked  Phyllis  innocently,  turning  her 
head. 

"Somebody  stepped  on  my  foot,"  he  replied. 

"I  thought  it  was  that,"  replied  the  girl  easily,  smiling  to 
herself  as  at  last  they  gained  the  street  and  gathered  together 
again. 

"Good-bye,  Mr.  Kerr,"  said  Mrs.  May,  holding  out  her 
hand.  "Come  and  see  us  to-morrow." 

"Good-bye,"  said  Phyllis,  without  anything  further. 

She  tried  to  climb  on  to  her  Peking  cart  with  dignity,  but 
she  was  not  to  the  manner  born  and  she  could  not  succeed. 

"You  cannot  be  as  independent  as  you  want  to  be,"  re- 
marked Peter  Kerr,  coming  to  her  rescue. 

Phyllis  pouted. 

"My  arms  are  not  made  of  iron,"  she  said,  "though,"  she 
added  as  soon  as  she  was  safe,  catching  his  eyes  for  a  moment, 
"I  admit  that  I  have  a  lot  to  learn." 

When  he  got  back  to  the  hotel,  Kerr  found  a  great  deal  to 
claim  his  immediate  attention,  though  he  would  have  liked 
absolute  peace.  There  was  first  a  communication  from  the 
Prince  (it  seemed  funny  to  have  him  writing  about  railways 
when  he  had  just  seen  him  kneeling  in  the  dust  before  a 
temple).  And  there  were  also  various  other  letters  as  well 
as  two  telegrams. 

Kerr,  with  a  hundred  recollections  rushing  through  his  head, 
had  a  difficult  task  in  fixing  his  attention ;  but  he  persevered 
and  worked  on  steadily. 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  429 

When  he  had  finished  he  began  laughing  boisterously. 
Things  were  certainly  getting  topsy-turvy  in  every  direction 
— all  over  the  world.  The  longest  wire  was  from  Jerkins — 
Mr.  Elihu  Jerkins — and  asked  angrily  why  he  was  breaking 
up  the  New  York  Syndicate's  provisional  agreement  regard- 
ing the  Great  Southern  Trunk.  Only  an  American  would 
use  swear- words  in  a  telegram,  thought  Kerr,  much  amused, 
as  he  turned  to  study  Barker's  message  once  more. 

Sir  James  Barker  strongly  endorsed  what  Mr.  Elihu  Jer- 
kins said — he  had  evidently  been  telegraphed  to  so  as  to 
bring  additional  pressure  on  Kerr.  He  said  that  other 
people's  contracts  must  be  left  severely  alone.  And  yet 
here  was  the  Prince  saying  that  if  Kerr  desired  it,  he  could 
get  that  provisional  agreement  torn  into  scraps  and  one  in 
his  name  substituted ! 

"Things  are  getting  topsy-turvy,"  repeated  Peter  Kerr, 
sitting  down  to  demand  full  explanations.  He  did  not 
understand  what  had  been  done  behind  his  back — and  now  he 
was  determined  to  know.  ...  It  was  very  puzzling. 

Suddenly  he  laughed  again  as  he  began  to  see  a  glimmering 
of  light. 

"There  are  other  sinners  in  the  world  besides  myself,"  he 
murmured  softly. 

"I  am  glad  we  came — oh,  I  wish  we  hadn't  come!"  thought 
Phyllis  passionately  for  many  hours  after  her  meeting.  "I 
will  see  him  no  more,"  she  added  fiercely.  Yet  just  then  she 
thought  tenderly,  "When  shall  I  see  him  again?" 

For  though  what  filled  her  seemed  inexplicable,  it  was 
nothing  but  her  budding  woman's  nature  angrily  rebelling 
against  that  curious  law  which  seemed  to  her  just  then  to 
mark  all  men  as  deceivers.  She  hated  it  all — she  hated  it. 
Yet  as,  with  a  sob  in  her  throat,  she  contemplated  the  strange 
past  and  sought  to  look  into  the  dim  future,  a  new  resolution 
was  slowly  born  in  her — the  resolution  to  shape  more  fully 
by  her  own  actions  what  that  future  should  be.  Dimly  she 


430  THE  HUMAN   COBWEB 

realized  that  it  was  folly  to  expect  men  to  be  anything  but 
men — she  saw  that  nothing  has  ever  changed  since  the 
immemorial  days  of  Adam  and  Eve. 

Daringly  her  intelligence  followed  on  to  seize  the  new  idea 
in  all  its  fullness;  and  in  her  rising  exaltation  the  bitterness 
which  had  been  consuming  her  was  slowly  effaced.  A  rap- 
ture of  unselfish  love,  at  once  voluptuous  and  austere,  sud- 
denly overwhelmed  her — her  eyes  became  dim — the  riot  in 
her  heart  was  tumultuous. 

For  at  last  the  immortal  truth  had  become  clear  to  her 
that  after  all  a  man  is  only  just  what  a  woman  makes  him 
feel. 


CHAPTER  V 

"Et  le  combat  cessa,  faute  de  combattants." 

CORNEILLE,  Le  Cid. 

"I  HAVE  just  been  talking  to  such  an  extraordinary  man," 
said  Phyllis  to  Peter  Kerr  a  few  afternoons  later,  when 
every  one  in  the  little  European  colony  was  gathered  together 
to  celebrate  the  birthday  of  some  king  or  emperor.  Perhaps 
being  among  so  many  solemn-looking  strangers  made  Phyllis 
unwittingly  more  kind  in  her  manner  to  Kerr  than  she 
really  wished  to  be.  For  though  the  two  had  met  every  day 
and  had  seemed  to  talk  cordially  enough  before  others,  no 
sooner  were  they  alone  than  Phyllis  quickly  relapsed  into  her 
curious  attitude  of  defiance — the  attitude  which  bade  him 
beware.  Kerr  wondered  just  now  whether  she  was  getting 
over  this  mood;  she  seemed  less  distant — less  on  her  guard. 

"Who  was  your  extraordinary  man?"  he  now  inquired, 
remarking  anew  how  fresh  was  her  colouring  among  the  wan 
faces  of  those  who  had  endured  many  Eastern  summers. 

"Well,"  continued  Phyllis,  "he  is  quite  easy  to  describe, 
though  I  couldn't  catch  his  name.  He  is  tall  and  has  a 
big  black  beard,  and  he  walks  in  a  quick,  shambling  way, 
as  if  he  were  not  quite  certain  of  his  knees.  Also  he  mumbles 
everything  he  says  in  his  beard.  Nevertheless  he  speaks 
such  excellent  English  that  it  was  not  until  the  end  of  our 
talk  that  I  discovered  he  was  a  foreigner.  Now  tell  me 
who  he  is." 

"That  is  curious — the  very  man,"  murmured  Peter  Kyrr, 
half  to  himself,  thinking  of  the  forecast  little  Mrs.  Hoperhl 
had  once  given  him  on  top  of  the  Tartar  Wall.  "I  don't 
know  who  he  is,"  he  continued  aloud,  "though  I  have  heard 
of  him.  He  must  have  been  in  hiding,  like  so  many  people 


432  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

here.     I  must  try  and  run  him  to  earth.     But  why  do  you 
call  him  extraordinary?" 

Phyllis  laughed  anew  at  the  recollection  of  her  conversation. 
"Well,  for  one  thing,  he  lectured  me  like  a  schoolgirl.  He 
wanted  to  know  why  I  came  to  Peking.  When  I  told  him 
I  didn't  know  in  the  least,  but  supposed  that  mere  female 
curiosity  was  responsible,  he  at  once  jumped  down  my 
throat.  Women,  he  assured  me  quite  candidly,  were  crea- 
tures who  never  knew  their  own  minds  and  who  had  just  to 
be  tolerated  by  men — well,  merely  because  they  were  abso- 
lutely necessary  to  the  continued  existence  of  the  human 
race.  After  that,  whilst  I  was  silently  recovering  from  his 
onslaught — for  he  said  a  good  many  other  rude  things — he 
began  talking  politics.  In  ten  minutes  he  told  me  more 
about  China  than  I  could  learn  by  myself  in  ten  months  or 
even  in  ten  years;  and  then,  as  soon  as  he  had  finished  his 
impromptu  lecture,  he  left  me  without  a  word  of  excuse.  Is 
that  extraordinary  or  not  ?  Perhaps  that  is  why  I  am  making 
myself  so  amiable  to  you,"  she  concluded,  glancing  at  him 
mischievously.  "My  pride  of  sex  has  been  sorely  hurt." 

"What  did  he  say  about  the  political  outlook?"  inquired 
Kerr  very  calmly,  as  if  he  had  not  heard  the  rest. 

Phyllis  frowned  hard  in  an  effort  to  recall  some  special 
sentence.  She  could  give  a  quick  sketch  of  things  in  very 
few  words,  but  she  hated  to  be  solemn  and  specific.  Now  her 
girlish  brow  looked  so  very  perplexed  as  she  tried  hard  to 
oblige  him,  that  Peter  Kerr  wrestled  only  half  successfully 
with  a  smile — for  he  wished  to  be  very  serious. 

"Well,  I  can  only  give  you  the  general  impression,"  she 
said  at  last,  "as  I  am  afraid  of  making  mistakes  with  the 
names.  He  said  that  things  had  come  to  a  stalemate,  and 
that  the  busy  times  of  intrigues  and  concessions  and  bullying 
were  all  quite  over." 

"Hum,"  said  Kerr,   now  frowning  a  bit  himself. 

"Oh,  there  was  something  else  I  can  remember,"  added 
Phyllis  suddenly.  "He  said  that  a  Chinese  Bismarck  was 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  433 

going  to  arise — General,  General — somebody  or  another. 
Oh,  I  have  forgotten." 

"Was  it  Li  Hung  Chang?"  inquired  Kerr,  looking  more 
interested. 

Phyllis  shook  her  head  slowly  as  she  vainly  strained  her 
memory  to  recall  the  name. 

"No,  it  wasn't  he,"  she  answered.  "My  extraordinary 
man  said  that  that  personage  was  as  dead  as  the  proverbial 
door-nail,  though  people  still  seemed  to  believe  in  him  as  a 
great  political  factor.  This  man,  General  Somebody,  was 
a  new  man,  quite  a  new  man — the  person  who  had  been  the 
real  factor  in  the  Empress  Dowager's  coup  d'etat." 

"That  is  rather  curious,"  said  Peter  Kerr  a  little  irrele- 
vantly. He  was  thinking  of  what  Captain  Emm  had  said  to 
him  about  some  new  power — and  was  trying  to  connect 
it  with  something  else  he  had  heard. 

"What  is  rather  curious?"  inquired  Phyllis,  looking 
puzzled. 

"Nothing  much,"  said  Kerr,  becoming  vague,  "excepting 
that  it  is  curious  that  nobody  has  heard  of  him  yet." 

Phyllis  studied  Peter  Kerr's  face  for  a  brief  moment  as  if  she 
did  not  believe  him.  Then  she  evidently  made  up  her  mind 
that  it  would  be  contrary  to  her  proclaimed  policy  to  show 
any  interest  in  his  thoughts;  for  she  at  once  gave  an  in- 
voluntary shrug  and  then  went  on  with  her  story. 

"I  like  the  way  my  gentleman  with  the  beajd  described 
the  coup  d'etat.  I  asked  him  exactly  what  had  happened, 
for  I  had  heard  a  good  deal  about  it  in  a  general  way.  This 
is  what  he  replied:  First  act,  a  weak  young  man  eats  an 
apple  from  the  Tree  of  Knowledge  handed  him  by  persons 
more  or  less  unknown.  Second  act,  the  weak  young  man, 
surrounded  by  other  young  men,  attempts  to  do  the  easiest 
things  in  the  world  in  the  weakest  way  possible.  Third  act, 
vigorous  mamma-in-law  appears,  shuts  the  weak  young  man 
up  in  his  rooms,  beats  his  wives,  flogs  his  eunuchs,  and  cuts 
the  head  off  most  of  the  other  young  men.  So-called  result, 


434  THE   HUMAN    COBWEB 

coup  d'etat  and  universal  fear.    Real  result,  nothing  at  all." 

Kerr  laughed. 

"Your  man  with  the  beard  is  anyway  an  approved  cynic," 
he  commented. 

Phyllis  nodded  reflectively  and  allowed  her  eyes  to  wander 
round  the  rooms  as  if  she  were  trying  to  see  where  he  had 
gone  to.  Phyllis  always  liked  people  out  of  the  common. 

"Yes,  and  he  added  that  now  the  real  and  only  problem  was 
what  was  to  be  Act  Four.  There  must  be  another  act,  he 
said.  You  see  how  much  I  have  learnt!" 

She  smiled  as  if  inviting  his  approbation.  But  Peter  Kerr, 
busy  with  his  own  thoughts,  made  no  immediate  answer. 
Was  something  more  to  happen  which  would  nip  his  new 
projects  in  the  bud?  Phyllis,  a  little  disappointed  at  his 
absorbed  air,  promptly  changed  the  conversation.  She  did 
not  care  a  bit  about  politics — she  would  never  have  men- 
tioned the  subject  to  any  one  else. 

"What  lovely  brasses  people  have  here,"  she  said,  pointing 
to  an  immense  incense-burner,  adorned  with  fantastic 
dragons,  which  stood  on  a  massive  pedestal  of  its  own. 
Covering  the  incense-burner  was  a  top  which  was  more 
fantastic  than  the  whole  urn.  It  represented  a  sea  in  which 
were  swimming  sea-dragons  wrestling  against  one  another 
in  a  deadly  struggle;  and  the  manner  in  which  the  artist 
had  given  fury  to  their  demonlike  faces  was  a  triumph  in 
itself.  In  quaint-looking  cabinets  there  were  dozens  of 
other  smaller  urns,  their  burnished  copper  sides  looking  like 
pale  gold  in  the  bright  daylight  and  lending  a  splendid 
decorative  effect  to  the  room.  "If  we  were  making  anything 
of  a  stay,"  Phyllis  continued  absently,  "I  think  I  should  begin 
a  collection  myself.  They  would  be  lovely  at  home.  But 
of  course  there  won't  be  time." 

Kerr  hesitated.  Had  he  been  mistaken,  or  had  he  really 
surprised  a  lightning-glance  from  under  her  eye-lashes? 

"If  you  want  to  stay  why  do  you  go  so  soon?"  he  inquired 
quite  calmly,  his  ideas  gathering  increasing  purpose  as  he 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  435 

spoke.  "It  is  hardly  worth  while  steaming  right  round  the 
world  if  you  do  not  have  time  to  see  things  properly." 

"I  did  not  say  I  wanted  to  stay,"  said  Phyllis  a  little 
stiffly,  purposely  drawing  back  as  if  he  had  made  uninvited 
advances.  "Our  plans  are  really  very  uncertain.  I  told 
mother  only  this  morning  that  I  thought  it  was  a  mistake 
to  have  come  to  Peking,  as  it  will  make  our  time  in  India  so 
short." 

"Oh,  really,"  said  Kerr  morosely,  putting  his  hands  in  his 
pockets  and  looking  the  other  way.  Phyllis  smiled  to  her- 
self for  just  one  instant;  but  suddenly  she  became  serious 
again,  until  something  fresh  caught  her  attention. 

"Why,  there  is  Monsieur  de  Boyar  at  last,"  she  exclaimed, 
nodding  to  the  man  with  glee  because  Kerr  had  turned. 

Instantly  the  thin  Russian  secretary,  seeing  her  signal, 
speeded  towards  her,  picking  his  way  sideways  through 
people  a  little  as  a  crab  crawls  round  pebbles. 

"How  are  you?"  he  asked,  bending  low  over  her  hand 
until  he  almost  touched  it  with  his  lips,  and  then  nodding 
quickly  to  Kerr.  "I  asked  because  I  hope  you  are  feeling 
energetic  enough  to  explain  an  English  conundrum  for  me." 

Phyllis  laughed  in  anticipation  of  some  absurdity. 

"I  will  if  I  can,"  she  answered  gaily,  "but  my  knowledge 
of  English  is  rather  worse  than  my  knowledge  of  most  other 
things.  Still,  it  doesn't  matter  much;  we  have  a  very 
experienced  Englishman  at  our  elbows  to  assist,  you  will 
remember.  Mr.  Kerr  will  know,  I'm  sure."  She  shot  a 
glance  at  him. 

De  Boyar  also  looked  at  Kerr,  and  laughed  as  if  he 
appreciated  the  joke.  But  he  stopped  very  soon,  for  Kerr 
had  become  preternaturally  solemn,  and  the  Russian  was 
above  all  things  a  diplomat. 

"It  is  really  a  serious  matter,"  he  continued,  "for  I  am 
badly  puzzled  and  I  do  not  like  to  be  puzzled.  It  is  very 
soon  told.  Do  you  see  that  pretty  woman  over  there?  I 
was  admiring  her  silently  when  I  heard  one  Englishman  ask 


436  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

another  Englishman  who  she  was.  This  is  what  the  second 
Englishman  answered,  making  the  first  one  laugh  a  good 
deal.  He  said :  'She  is  a  grass  widow  who  is  the  new  rating 
for '  and  the  rest  I  did  not  catch." 

De  Boyar  paused  a  second,  looked  at  both  people  mis- 
chievously, and  then  continued  blandly: 

"Now  I  know  what  a  grass  widow  is — but  what  in  the 
name  of  Heaven  is  a  rating?" 

He  rolled  the  r  of  the  last  word  so  tremendously  in  a 
purely  Russian  way  that  its  very  absurdity  set  his  two  listen- 
ers involuntarily  laughing. 

"I  don't  know,  I'm  sure,"  said  Phyllis  with  her  handker- 
chief up  to  her  mouth,  wondering  whether  De  Boyar  was 
going  a  little  too  far. 

"Mr.  Kerr,"  said  the  irrepressible  De  Boyar,  jumping  his 
eyes  from  one  to  the  other,  "I  turn  to  you — the  experienced 
man!" 

Kerr  observed  Phyllis  in  a  curious  way,  and  then: 

"A  rating  can  mean  various  things  in  English,"  he  said 
hesitatingly,  "but  I  suppose  what  was  meant  was  a  naval 
rating." 

"Ha-ha!"  cried  De  Boyar,  "we  are  getting  closer!  First 
it  was  only  a  rating — now  it  is  a  naval  rating!  And  what 
is  a  naval  rating,  please?" 

"A  rating  is  a  technical  term  in  use  among  sailors,"  said 
Kerr.  "For  instance,  for  drafts — joining  a  ship.  So  many 
new  ratings  will  join  H.M.S.  Butterfly,"  he  concluded, 
suddenly  falling  into  the  spirit  of  the  thing  and  laughing 
heartily. 

De  Boyar  whistled  to  himself. 

"But  he  explains  beautifully,"  he  cried  to  Phyllis,  "and  the 
romance  is  clear  to  me.  It  is  a  romance  of  the  sea!  The 
pretty  lady  is  about  to  become  a  mermaid !  But  I  will  not 
tell  Kerr — he  is  a  man  and  can  find  out  for  himself.  Mr. 
Kerr,  your  sphere  of  usefulness  has  ceased — understand 
that  you  are  de  tropT 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  437 

"Go  away,  Mr.  Kerr,"  said  Phyllis.  "Monsieur  de  Boyar 
wants  to  tell  me  secrets." 

Nevertheless  she  looked  at  Peter  Kerr  with  a  curious  look 
in  her  eyes — as  if  she  really  wanted  him  to  stay.  But  Kerr 
had  purposely  become  rather  blind.  He  would  go  away — 
and  come  back  later. 

"But  you  are  really  cruel  to  the  poor  man,"  De  Boyar 
protested  as  Kerr  walked  off,  not  telling  Phyllis  anything 
further  about  the  lady  he  had  spoken  of.  "He  has  had 
hard  luck,  too,  in  Peking." 

"Really,"  said  Phyllis  evasively,  now  sorry  that  she  had  let 
Kerr  go.  She  did  not  wish  to  hear  excuses  made  for  him. 

"Yes,"  said  De  Boyar,  keeping  to  his  point,  and  talking  with 
unaccustomed  seriousness.  "By  rights  he  should  have  got  his 
great  concession,  and  he  only  missed  it  by  just  one  little 
inch — owing  to  a  stroke  of  bad  luck.  I  know  all  about  it, 
I  assure  you.  I  have  always  been  sorry  for  him — he  has 
never  complained  once." 

"How  Spartan!"  commented  Phyllis,  determined  to  show 
neither  interest  nor  concern.  Yet  there  was  something  in 
her  voice  which  did  not  escape  De  Boyar's  attention. 

"Miss  May,"  he  began  suddenly,  with  his  seriousness  ban- 
ished and  his  eyes  twinkling  again,  "do  you  know  that  a 
man  can  love  several  women  at  the  same  time  ?" 

Phyllis's  face  changed  so  quickly  that  De  Boyar  laughed 
still  more.  He  saw  that  he  had  jumped  right  across  her  train 
of  thought.  He  would  lead  her  on  and  then  disappoint  her 
— for  De  Boyar,  for  all  his  talk,  never  said  anything  which 
he  should  not  have  said  excepting  to  one  or  two  very  old 
friends. 

"What  a  madman  you  are,  Monsieur  de  Boyar,"  replied 
Phyllis  a  trifle  uneasily,  wondering  if  she  had  not  allowed 
him  too  much  liberty  in  the  past.  She  was  not  much  accus- 
tomed to  continental  men,  and  this  one  was  of  a  type  she 
had  never  seen  before.  He  took  everything  for  granted.  It 
was  all  very  well  to  be  serious  about  foolish  things  and 


438  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

foolish  about  serious  things,  but  she  imagined  that  that 
method  could  become  a  two-edged  knife. 

"Why  am  I  a  madman?" 

De  Boyar  had  asked  the  question,  after  a  moment's  reflec- 
tion, as  quickly  as  a  bullet  is  discharged  from  a  rifle. 

"Because  you  are  always  propounding  strange  theories 
or  conundrums." 

"But  that  is  surely  not  a  sign  of  madness." 

Phyllis  shrugged  her  shoulders  in  a  little  way  she  had. 
She  was  still  uneasy,  but  had  begun  to  hope  that  she  could 
lead  away  from  the  one  subject  she  feared. 

"I  think  it  is  a  sign  of  madness  in  your  case,"  she  argued  a 
little  weakly,  wondering  why  her  wits  were  deserting  her. 

"And  all  because  I  said  that  a  man  could  love  several 
women  at  the  same  time,"  protested  De  Boyar,  clasping  his 
thin  hands.  "Yet  what  I  announce  is  a  self-evident  proposi- 
tion." 

"Why?"  said  Phyllis  a  little  defiantly,  determined  now  to 
hear  him  out  and  see  what  he  meant. 

"Because,"  announced  De  Boyar  triumphantly,  "a  man 
falls  in  love  with  a  type — not  really  with  a  woman.  Do 
you  not  know  that?  Students  of  psychology  know  it — I  am 
a  student  of  psychology — I  know  it — and  therefore  I  love 
all  the  women  in  the  world  of  my  chosen  type.  Is  that  mad 
or  not?" 

"What  is  the  type  which  you  honour?"  inquired  Phyllis, 
with  amusement  now  uppermost  in  her  voice  and  eyes, 
though  she  was  still  half  afraid. 

"I  will  tell  you,"  said  De  Boyar,  looking  carefully  round 
as  if  he  feared  that  his  confession  might  be  overheard  by 
others.  "I  love  small  women  who  appear  anaemic — very, 
anaemic — and  who  have  blue  eyes  and  weak  voices — and 
who  look  as  if  any  great  emotion  would  kill  them.  That  is 
my  type." 

Phyllis  laughed  ringingly:  she  saw  that  De  Boyar  would 
inevitably  lead  himself  astray  because  he  was  talking  of 
himself  instead  of  somebody  else. 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  439 

"How  dreadful,"  she  said,  "to  like  such  sickly  women." 

De  Boyar  agreed  quite  seriously,  shaking  his  thin  face  dole- 
fully. 

"They  generally  die  before  I  can  make  my  declaration," 
he  announced.  "It  is  my  great  misfortune — but  what  can 
I  do?  I  was  born  like  that,  and  that  type  will  remain  with 
me  until  I  die.  Now  what  is  your  type?" 

"I  refuse  absolutely  to  tell  you — unless "   She  hesitated. 

"Unless  what?"  said  De  Boyar  breathlessly. 

"Unless  you  give  me  a  week  to  think  up  my  answer,"  she 
replied  laughingly.  "You  see  the  idea  is  new  to  me." 

"Oh,"  exclaimed  De  Boyar,  much  disappointed,  "I  sup- 
pose I  shall  have  to  agree,  since  a  lady's  wish  is  law." 

"Tell  me  the  names  of  all  the  interesting  people  here," 
said  Phyllis  quickly,  escaping  finally  from  all  danger.  "For 
instance,  I  want  to  know  all  about  an  extraordinary  man 
who  is  almost  as  original  as  you  are." 

De  Boyar  listened  to  her  description  of  the  man,  and  he 
was  at  once  able  to  enlighten  her  regarding  his  identity; 
for  De  Boyar  always  knew  everybody. 

"But  there  are  really  very  few  interesting  people  now,"  he 
continued,  talking  seriously  as  if  he  had  chaffed  long  enough. 
"They  have  all  gone.  The  man  who  worked  with  Kerr,  an 
Italian  called  Lorenzo,  was  really  interesting — remarkable. 
Then  there  was  a  Mrs.  Hopeful,  who  was  the  strangest  little 
personage  in  the  world,  as  well  as  many  others.  Now  we 
are  dull — everything  is  over — cest  settlement  la  diplomatic 
ga!"  he  concluded  moodily,  pointing  disdainfully  round  the 
room.  "The  old  Empress  Dowager  has  reduced  us  to 
complete  nothingness.  The  battle  is  over — for  the  time 
being.  We  have  nothing  to  do — not  a  thing." 

"Then  what  do  you  do  all  day  long?" 

He  looked  at  her  in  surprise. 

"What  do  we  do?"  he  repeated.  "Nothing!  We  eat,  we 
drink,  we  sleep — what  more  do  you  want  ?  There  are  some- 
times a  few  despatches." 

He  talked  on  for  a  quarter  of  an  hour  or  so,  describing  the 


440  THE    HUMAN    COBWEB 

people  who  had  enlivened  the  town  in  the  spring  and  summer 
and  whose  absence  he  now  so  deplored;  but  something  had 
taken  the  edge  off  his  sharp  way  of  describing  things,  and 
Phyllis  began  to  find  him  a  little  tedious.  She  was  not  sorry 
when  Kerr  came  back.  The  thin  Russian,  having  shot  all 
his  arrows,  bowed  himself  away. 

"Shall  we  go  out  on  that  verandah?"  suggested  Phyllis, 
nodding  her  head  to  where  people  were  comfortably  dawd- 
ling on  cane  chairs.  "It  has  become  suffocating  in  this 
room — I  have  never  seen  a  sun  like  this  Peking  sun.  Look 
at  it." 

The  afternoon  rays,  though  it  was  autumn,  were  stream- 
ing through  the  westerly  windows  as  though  they  were 
molten  fire;  and  in  that  brilliant  light  the  air  seemed  filled 
with  impalpable  dust.  The  sound  of  so  many  voices,  all 
talking  against  one  another,  added  to  the  feeling  of  oppres- 
sion and  confinement;  and  Kerr  was  just  as  glad  as  Phyllis 
to  sit  down  quietly  a  little  distance  away.  He  liked  to 
think — even  if  it  was  only  a  delusion — that  she  still  really 
cared  for  his  company  more  than  that  of  other  men — that  she 
was  at  heart  the  same  as  before. 

"It  is  very  gay  just  now,"  he  reflected  aloud  for  her 
benefit,  looking  back  at  the  room  they  had  left.  "People  are 
exciting  themselves  with  their  voices  and  believing  that  they 
are  quite  happy.  But  generally  it  is  the  very  reverse." 

"Yes?"  said  Phyllis  inquiringly.  She  wanted  him  to  talk 
to  hear  what  he  really  thought.  Hitherto  he  had  said  very 
little,  excepting  on  commonplace  subjects,  fearing  that  to 
do  otherwise  would  be  to  expose  himself  to  those  biting 
remarks  which  she  always  had  at  her  command  when  she 
was  provoked. 

"I  mean,"  said  Kerr  slowly,  as  if  he  were  thinking  aloud, 
"that  generally  one  sees  nothing  of  people  at  all  here — 
nothing  save  endless  yellow  hordes  who  flood  the  streets 
and  radically  alter  one's  own  outlook  in  some  peculiar  way. 
At  home  they  speak  of  the  submerged  tenth — how  much 
worse  it  is  to  belong  to  the  submerged  millionth!  That  is 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  441 

practically  one's  fate  out  here — one  is  drowned  in  the  flood 
of  yellow  men.  And  as  there  is  nothing  to  see  in  them, 
one  soon  ceases  noticing  them,  and  begins  to  notice  only  one's 
self.  That  is  why  the  European  is  inclined  foolishly  to 
imagine  that  he  is  an  uplifted  person — a  favoured  being — 
when  if  he  only  knew  it  he  is  submerged,  if  not  drowned. 
It  is  the  life  apart  which  does  that — the  absence  of  real 
people  in  the  streets." 

Phyllis  shifted  her  position  ever  so  slightly,  as  if  her  chair 
had  become  uncomfortable.  Was  this  a  confession?  She 
waited  to  hear  him  further,  but  now  he  remained  silent. 

"Then  if  you  feel  like  that  why  do  you  stay  on?"  she 
inquired  gravely.  "You  came  out  because  you  wanted  to — 
because  you  said  you  had  a  great  idea  which  you  valued  very 
much.  But  that  is  no  reason  why  you  should  stay — indefi- 
nitely." 

"Why  do  I  stay?"  repeated  Kerr,  as  if  he  had  not  heard 
the  other  things.  "Well,  I  will  tell  you.  Mainly  because 
I  am  obstinate  and  hate  to  be  beaten — because  I  do  not 
intend  to  be  really  beaten  now  that  I  begin  to  understand 
things.  That's  all."  He  suddenly  folded  his  arms  across 
his  chest  as  if  that  was  his  defiance. 

"It  has  apparently  taken  you  some  time  to  understand 
things,"  slowly  commented  Phyllis,  involuntarily  remember- 
ing for  the  hundredth  time  all  she  had  heard. 

"Yes,"  he  admitted  with  a  certain  grim  brevity  of  manner 
which  she  liked,  "it  has  taken  me  some  time." 

She  was  watching  the  crowd  through  the  open  windows 
when  she  next  spoke — a  little  too  intently  to  carry  con- 
viction that  the  scene  really  interested  her. 

"How  much  longer  will  you  have  to  stop?"  she  asked 
carelessly. 

"I  don't  know,"  said  Kerr  in  a  dogged  way,  "but  I  will 
not  move  until  I  have  something  to  show  for  all  my  trouble." 

"Dear  me!"  exclaimed  Phyllis  suddenly,  with  assumed 
gaiety,  trying  to  think  she  was  not  disappointed,  "then  you 
may  become  a  second  Old  Man  of  the  Mountain,  if  it  is  true 


442  THE   HUMAN    COBWEB 

that  the  golden  times  for  concessionnaires  are  over.  I  have 
been  reading  all  about  the  Old  Man  of  the  Mountain,  and 
his  end  was  a  sorry  one." 

"Perhaps,"  said  Kerr,  refusing  to  get  drawn  into  any 
further  discussion.  Fortunately  he  had  not  read  about  that 
gentleman :  had  he  done  so,  he  would  not  have  been  flattered 
at  the  comparison. 

"I  am  sorry  for  you,"  she  returned.  "I  tremble  to  think 
what  you  will  be  like  after  a  decade  or  two  of  the  introspec- 
tion which  you  say  must  accompany  residence  in  Asia." 

Involuntarily  he  smiled  at  her.  She  had  said  it  all  so 
glibly.  Phyllis  always  touched  his  risibilities  with  her  quick 
retorts.  There  was  always  in  them  a  germ  of  great  wisdom. 

"I  shall  be  pretty  awful,  I  admit,"  he  said,  "but  I  shall 
win  my  point." 

"The  price  of  victory  will  be  clearly  written  for  all  of  us 
to  behold — that  is,  if  we  can  live  so  long,"  she  continued, 
mainly  because  she  was  annoyed. 

This  time  he  did  not  answer,  so  she  was  forced  to  continue : 

"There  will  be  nothing  to  console  you  either,"  she  ven- 
tured at  last;  secretly  a  little  in  fear  and  trembling,  as  she 
keenly  watched  his  profile. 

He  turned  at  once. 

"What  do  you  mean?"  he  said  abruptly. 

Phyllis  looked  at  him  boldly:  he  might  guess,  but  she 
would  never  tell  what  she  meant. 

"I  only  mean,"  she  said  calmly,  "that  Sir  James  Barker 
always  says  that  the  pioneer — the  man  who  apparently 
carries  off  the  prize — is  never  the  man  who  really  profits  by 
it.  He  says  that  it  is  the  spider,  who  sets  webs  to  catch 
others,  who  wins  everything." 

"Does  he  say  that?"  rejoined  Kerr,  feeling  that  she  had 
foiled  him,  and  thinking  at  the  same  time  of  the  curious 
developments  in  the  China  railway  market  which  were 
being  telegraphed  to  him.  It  would  be  worth  while  to  watch 
Barker.  "Perhaps  he  may  be  mistaken  in  me,"  he  added. 

"Why  should  he  be?"  asked  Phyllis,  beginning  the  attack 


THE   HUMAN    COBWEB  443 

anew  from  another  quarter.  "I  am  sure  he  will  get  to 
know  all  he  wants  to  long  before  you  suspect  it.  He  has  a 
wonderful  knack  for  getting  information." 

Kerr  was  now  plainly  angry  and  could  hardly  hide  it. 

"Your  mother  is  looking  for  you,  I  think,"  he  said,  abruptly 
getting  up. 

"You  are  unusually  thoughtful  about  others  to-day,"  re- 
joined Phyllis,  determined  to  have  the  last  word. 

He  made  his  adieus  at  the  same  time  as  the  Mays;  and 
in  the  interval  which  elapsed  before  they  were  all  out-of- 
doors  he  had  recovered  somewhat  his  composure.  Mrs.  May 
was  very  busy  listening  to  a  lady  who  was  telling  her  the 
very  best  place  to  buy  embroideries  cheap — where  cunning 
Chinese  traders  would  not  completely  swindle  her — and 
Phyllis  somehow  fell  behind. 

"Have  you  brought  your  riding-habit?"  inquired  Kerr, 
coming  up  to  her  suddenly. 

"Good  heavens,  is  that  you?  I  thought  you  had  gone 
away  long  ago,"  she  replied,  laughing  at  him. 

"Have  you  brought  your  riding-habit?"  he  repeated. 

"Yes,"  said  Phyllis;  "but  you  are  rather  rude.  Your 
side  of  the  conversation  is  apparently  the  only  part  that 
interests  you." 

"Would  you  like  to  ride?"  he  continued  imperturbably. 

"Perhaps,"  she  answered,  "if  you  do  not  propose  to  break 
my  neck." 

"I  have  loads  of  ponies,"  he  rejoined. 

"They  look  awfully  savage  little  brutes,"  she  said  doubt- 
fully, as  if  she  wished  to  prolong  the  conversation. 

But  Mrs.  May  was  looking  back. 

"When?"  said  Phyllis  hurriedly,  abandoning  her  involved 
tactics  and  become  direct. 

"To-morrow?"  he  inquired. 

She  nodded  her  acquiescence  and  her  farewell  and  ran  on. 
Kerr  suddenly  breathed  deeply  and  walked  more  slowly. 

That  evening  something  made  Phyllis  more  thoughtful 
than  ever.  The  day  had  been  curiously  eventful  for  her, 
though  nothing  had  happened.  Perhaps  it  was  just  that. 


CHAPTER  VI 

"Peu  de  gens  connaissent  la  raort;  on  la  souffre 
non  par  resolution,  mais  par  la  stupidite  et  par 
la  coutume,  et  la  plupart  des  hommes  meurent 
parce  qu'on  meurt." — LA  ROCHEFOUCAULD. 

"I  HAVE  never  seen  such  a  curious  country,"  said  Phyllis, 
pointing  with  her  whip  to  the  prospect  before  them.  "It 
looks  as  if  there  had  been  some  great  convulsion  of  nature — 
something  much  worse  than  the  ordinary  earthquake — 
something  which  has  tilted  the  earth  up  and  down,  then 
scorched  it  to  death.  What  a  hideous  grey-brown  it  all  is!" 

Kerr  protested  that  luck  was  against  her;  had  she  seen  it, 
he  said,  a  few  weeks  earlier,  when  the  giant  crops  still 
covered  the  land,  she  would  have  had  a  very  different 
opinion. 

"You  are  becoming  as  bad  as  a  Chinaman,"  rejoined  Phyllis, 
totally  unconvinced.  "It  is  ugly — hideously  ugly,  and 
nothing  else." 

As  a  matter  of  fact,  where  they  were  now  riding  the 
countryside  had  certainly  a  somewhat  amazing  appearance. 
The  ring  of  distant  hills  and  mountains  which  generally 
lent  such  dignity  to  the  vast  plains  surrounding  the  capital 
were  to-day  obscured  by  a  thick  haze.  Not  a  trace  could  be 
seen  of  these  towering  barriers — barriers  which  were  really 
the  key-note  to  the  fortified  city  set  at  their  foot.  The 
result  was  certainly  unfortunate  for  the  landscape,  Kerr  him- 
self remarked.  It  looked  mournful,  sullen,  barren.  He  had 
wished  Phyllis  to  realize  something  of  the  subtle  charm  of 
issuing  forth  from  the  great  City  Gates  as  they  just  had  done, 
and  seizing  in  a  single  glance  the  salient  points  of  this 
historic  region. 

But  everything  was  against  them.     Not  only  was  the  road 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  445 

on  which  they  were  riding  sunk  many  feet  below  the  surface 
of  the  fields,  but  for  some  reason  as  far  as  the  eye  could 
see  there  was  nothing  but  great  holes  and  torn  patches  in 
the  earth,  alternating  with  ugly  crumbling  mosses.  By 
what  strange  process  this  had  come  about  it  was  impossible 
to  say.  Occasionally,  too,  they  passed  ruined  mud  walls,  and 
broken  stone  bridges,  and  dead  trees,  and  other  equally 
melancholy  objects.  The  vivid  sunlight  served  to  make  all 
the  curious  desolation  more  uncouth  than  it  would  have  been 
otherwise — the  sunlight  was  a  search-light  turned  on  to  make 
every  inch  of  the  abomination  unmistakably  clear. 

"Do  you  see  that?"  cried  Kerr,  pointing  to  a  broken  line 
of  high  earthwork  running  due  north  and  south,  and  glad 
that  there  was  something  new  to  comment  on.  "That  used 
to  be  part  of  the  old  City  Wall.  The  Tartar  city  was  once 
nearly  twice  as  big  as  it  is  now.  It  was  immense — the  marvel 
of  mediaeval  times.  Perhaps  that  is  why  it  is  so  ugly  here — 
we  must  be  riding  through  the  remains  of  the  city  which  dis- 
appeared hundreds  of  years  ago.'" 

"Well,"  rejoined  Phyllis  unfeelingly,  "the  remains  are  a 
marvel  to  this  humble  person,  if  that  salves  their  feelings. 
What  a  region  of  dust  and  dirt!" 

They  did  not  speak  again  until,  passing  through  a  gap  in 
the  ruined  earthen  rampart,  they  had  at  length  issued  out 
on  to  more  level  fields. 

"This  is  better,"  cried  Phyllis,  somewhat  relieved.  "Any- 
way there  are  actually  some  trees,  and  the  poor  things  still 
appear  green." 

A  beggar  woman,  her  tattered  blue  coat  and  trousers 
hardly  sufficient  to  cover  her  nakedness,  hearing  the  stamp 
of  hoofs,  slouched  suddenly  forward  from  under  the  lea  of 
a  broken  mud  wall  against  which  she  had  been  leaning,  and 
commenced  begging  in  a  whining  voice.  Her  uncombed  hair, 
her  miserable  eyes,  her  feeble  walk — all  attested  her  genuine 
distress.  She  kept  on  begging  in  a  monotonous  whine  which 
was  infinitely  exasperating — which  could  not  really  produce 
any  genuine  feeling  of  pity. 


446  THE  HUMAN  COBWEB 

"Do  give  her  something  and  send  her  away  quickly,"  said 
Phyllis,  shuddering.  "Desolation  and  destitution  get  on 
my  nerves  horribly.  Somehow  I  am  not  enjoying  this  ride 
a  little  bit." 

"Shall  we  turn  back  then?"  suggested  Kerr  with  a  shade 
of  irritation  in  his  voice,  after  he  had  found  and  thrown  a 
coin  to  the  woman.  It  certainly  had  not  been  a  success  so 
far;  and  he  was  wise  enough  to  know  that  things  which 
begin  badly  generally  end  worse.  Phyllis  was  to-day  in  a 
strangely  enigmatical  and  disappointing  mood,  which  was 
the  natural  sequel  to  having  lain  awake  a  goodly  part  of  the 
night.  She  had  thought  so  much  about  so  many  things  that 
she  had  tired  herself;  and  when  people  are  tired  they  are 
inevitably  cross — and  delight  to  make  others  so  too. 

So  Phyllis  now  purposely  took  some  time  to  make  up  her 
mind  and  give  her  answer.  She  swept  the  countryside  with 
her  eyes  in  quest  of  something  of  interest,  playing  with  her 
hands  on  her  pony's  mouth  in  a  way  which  was  certainly 
not  good  for  his  temper. 

"No,  I  don't  think  I  want  to  go  back,"  she  said  at  length 
in  a  decided  way,  staring  straight  ahead  of  her.  "I  think 
we  will  ride  on.  Are  those  people  or  ants  over  there  ?  They 
are  simply  swarming!" 

Kerr  looked.  Countless  blue  dots  were  gathered  round  a 
small,  mud-coloured  village  a  mile  or  two  away;  the  dots 
were  moving  uneasily  to  and  fro,  collecting  and  dispersing, 
massing  and  then  thinning  out  in  a  peculiar  way  which 
bespoke  much  agitation. 

"They  look  like  ants,"  he  replied,  "but  I  suppose  they  are 
real  people  beginning  the  usual  row,  which  appears  to  be 
the  only  popular  form  of  relaxation  in  this  country." 

"Anything  for  an  excitement,"  said  Phyllis,  looking  more 
cheerful;  "let's  ride  there."  She  drew  herself  up,  as  if  she 
were  going  faster. 

M<No,"  said  Kerr  shortly  and  decidedly,  pulling  in  as  he 
spoke.  "We  had  better  avoid  that  village.  I  don't  want 
excitement  in  any  form." 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  447 

"How  curious,  for  I  do,"  called  Phyllis  wilfully  back  to 
him,  suddenly  beginning  to  canter  towards  this  animated  spot 
as  if  it  were  a  magnet. 

Kerr  hesitated  a  minute,  and  then  in  a  few  strides  of  the 
active  little  pony  he  was  riding,  caught  up  with  her.  He 
attempted  to  expostulate,  but  it  was  all  in  vain. 

"We  have  all  been  warned  to  keep  out  of  rows,"  he  cried 
in  conclusion,  "and  I  don't  want  to  be  responsible  for  your 
safety." 

Phyllis  nodded  her  thanks  mockingly,  and  then  went  on  all 
the  faster. 

"I  am  not  afraid  of  a  few  Chinamen,  even  if  you  are,"  she 
called  presently;  "wait  for  me,  if  you  like.  /  haven't  been 
warned !" 

Saying  which,  she  brought  down  her  whip  defiantly  once 
more  and  quickened  her  canter  into  a  sharp  hand-gallop 
which  carried  her  swiftly  from  him  along  the  dusty  highway. 

Kerr  muttered  to  himself  at  the  curious  perversity  of 
woman,  and  rode  after  *her.  They  were  now  close  enough 
to  see  that  some  very  unusual  commotion  had  gathered  these 
many  people  together.  Judging  by  the  stormlike  cries  which 
came  across  the  fields,  a  crisis  had  arisen  which  was  being 
angrily  solved.  Kerr  marvelled,  as  he  had  often  done  before, 
at  the  numbers  of  people  which  could  be  so  rapidly  conjured 
up  out  of  barren  space:  for  here  was  a  great  multitude  in 
the  midst  of  apparent  desolation.  Where  did  they  spring 
from?  He  remembered  suddenly  the  great  fire  and  the 
ugly  crowds  of  the  streets  on  the  day  of  the  coup  d'etat;  and 
as  he  remembered  what  had  happened  he  definitely  made  up 
his  mind. 

"Look  here,"  he  insisted,  "we  can't  go  into  that  crowd, 
whether  you  want  to  or  not.  You  have  got  to  stop." 

He  rode  up  close  beside  Phyllis,  and  shifting  the  reins  in 
his  hands,  he  suddenly  bent  forward  and  caught  her  bridle. 

Phyllis  instantly  coloured  with  anger. 

"I  am  riding  this  pony,  I  think,"  she  said  with  attempted 
dignity,  trying  to  shake  him  off,  as  this  rather  dangerous 


448  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

manoeuvre  brought  the  ponies  to  a  quick  stop.  "So  I  should 
really  be  much  obliged  if  you  would  let  go." 

"I  have  no  intention  of  letting  go  unless  you  turn  back," 
said  Peter  Kerr,  now  trying  to  make  a  joke  of  it,  but  still 
with  growing  anger  in  his  heart  at  her  obstinacy. 

"Mr.  Kerr,"  said  Phyllis,  suddenly  losing  her  temper  com- 
pletely, "unless  you  let  go,  I  shall  simply  slip  to  the  ground 
and  walk  to  that  crowd.  I  warn  you  I  have  made  up  my 
mind." 

"Oh,  have  you?"  he  replied  a  little  doubtfully.  He  paused, 
knowing  that  the  girl  would  not  hesitate  to  carry  out  her 
threat;  then  very  fortunately  the  problem  suddenly  solved 
itself.  For  the  crowd  was  now  quickly  advancing  towards 
them,  winding  like  an  uncouth  serpent  over  the  plain,  and 
raising  clouds  of  dust  which  hung  heavily  in  the  air.  The 
hoarse  shouting  eloquently  advertised  that  something  was  on 
foot. 

Kerr  instantly  released  his  hold. 

"If  we  remain  where  we  are  now,"  he  now  remarked 
calmly,  watching  Phyllis  out  of  the  corner  of  his  eyes,  whilst 
he  pretended  to  shade  the  sun  from  his  face  with  a  hand, 
"you  will  be  able  to  see  all  you  want,  as  that  mob  will  sweep 
right  over  us.  It  will  be  rather  cheerful,  I  should  imagine, 
for  they  seem  in  a  combative  frame  of  mind." 

And  taking  out  his  cigarette-case,  he  prepared  to  smoke. 

The  pink  slowly  faded  from  Phyllis's  cheeks  as  the  hoarse 
roar  became  louder  and  louder,  and  it  is  supposed  that 
inwardly  she  regretted  her  stubbornness.  But  Phyllis  was 
a  proud  girl  as  well  as  brave,  and  she  would  have  sooner  died 
than  have  confessed  to  feeling  any  tremor.  Nearer  and 
nearer  came  the  shouting  throng,  with  hundreds  of  men 
and  boys  running  in  advance  of  the  main  body,  and  many 
women  bringing  up  the  rear.  It  was  a  remarkable  spectacle 
— for  a  stranger. 

"I  think,"  said  Peter  Kerr,  when  he  reckoned  that  she  had 
stood  it  long  enough,  "that  on  second  thoughts  we  will 
really  get  a  better  view — and  less  pdour  and  dust — if  we 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  449 

ride  to  the  top  of  that  knoll  over  there."  And  wisely  not 
waiting  for  an  answer,  he  led  the  way. 

Phyllis  slowly  followed ;  and  though  she  would  have  liked 
to  feel  scorn  and  pity  written  on  her  features,  there  was  to 
be  seen  manifest  relief. 

There  was  something  oddly  menacing  in  the  appearance  of 
the  mob — something  which  scented  of  the  spilling  of  blood. 
There  was  stern  decision  written  in  the  rapid  forward  move- 
ment— there  was  something  suggestive  of  the  world's  Great 
Tragedy  in  the  manner  in  which  the  women  followed  from 
afar.  The  pair  watched  in  silence  the  near  approach  of  this 
strange  array,  whilst  secretly  they  puzzled  over  the  explana- 
tion. Then  suddenly  Phyllis  trembled,  for  her  quick  eyes  had 
picked  out  something. 

"Do  you  see  what  it  is — do  you  see  ?"  she  said  in  awestruck 
tones.  "They  are  carrying  two  people  in  a  wooden  cage, 
there  in  the  middle" — she  stopped,  looked  hard,  and  pressed 
a  hand  to  her  bosom — "a  man  and  a  woman — yes,  a  man 
and  a  woman.  Oh,  what  are  they  going  to  do?" 

In  her  anxiety  the  girl  began  to  ride  slowly  forward, 
gazing  as  if  she  had  become  fascinated  by  the  strange  sight. 
Kerr  perforce  followed,  with  an  ominous  frown  settling  on 
his  face.  His  two  mafus,  full  of  the  insatiable  curiosity  of 
their  race,  had  already  ridden  to  one  side  and  accosted  some 
of  the  crowd ;  now  they  were  listening  greedily,  with  strange 
expressions  on  their  faces,  to  the  tale  which  was  shouted  to 
them  in  rough  gutturals. 

Phyllis  rode  a  little  faster  and  a  little  nearer. 

"A  young  man  and  a  young  woman,"  she  said  in  a  low 
voice,  as  if  she  had  forgotten  Peter  Kerr's  presence.  "Oh, 
what  are  they  going  to  do  to  them?"  She  had  become  very 
pale. 

Kerr  threw  his  cigarette,  which  was  only  half  smoked,  to 
the  ground. 

"Look  here,"  he  said  with  attempted  authority,  "it  is  none 
of  our  business,  anyway.  Our  business  is  to  leave  the  people 
alone  and  not  to  get  mixed  up  in  any  trouble." 


450  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

"But  they  are  going  to  hurt  them  in  some  cruel  way,  I'm 
sure,"  cried  Phyllis  frantically,  her  quick  sympathy  now 
fully  aroused,  "and  you  and  I,  who  are  civilized,  can't 
allow  that.  Look  at  the  poor  woman:  she  is  waving  to  me. 
She  has  seen  that  I  understand.  Oh,  do  something!" 

Kerr,  in  spite  of  what  he  had  said,  instinctively  rode  right 
up  close  to  the  cage:  Phyllis  was  left  a  little  behind. 

"What  is  it?"  she  said  quickly  to  one  of  Kerr's  men, 
fearing  that  she  would  not  understand  his  jargon. 

"Bad  wife,  bad  young  man — take  water,"  replied  the 
man  unemotionally,  yet  watching  his  master's  back  as  if  he 
feared  that  he  might  overhear  him. 

"Oh,"  cried  Phyllis  in  an  agony  of  emotion,  going  after 
Kerr,  "do  you  know  that  they  are  going  to  be  drowned — 
like  kittens  in  a  basket?  It  is  horrible,  and  we  must  stop  it." 

The  colour  chased  across  the  girl's  face  in  rapid  waves  as 
many  thoughts  crowded  her  mind.  Kerr  turned  on  her 
sternly. 

"How  do  you  know  that?"  he  said  abruptly. 

"Your  men  say  so — your  men  have  told  me.     Oh,  stop  it!" 

He  cast  a  furious  look  at  them;  and  then  sat  his  pony 
silently,  debating  what  he  should  answer.  He  too  had 
instinctively  understood  what  it  was;  it  was  a  cruel  village 
law  about  to  be  passionately  vindicated. 

"How  can  I  stop  it?"  he  said  irresolutely  at  last.  They 
were  still  following  on  the  flank  of  the  strange  procession, 
always  in  full  view  of  the  rude  wooden  cage — always  with 
the  poor  woman  appealing  with  her  hands  and  supplicating 
with  hysterical  words.  The  quick,  short  calls  of  the  men  car- 
rying the  cage,  the  hoarse  murmur  of  the  crowd,  the  women 
and  children  following  in  fear  and  trembling — all  these 
things  now  struck  him  with  the  force  of  dagger-thrusts. 
The  thing  had  become  horrible. 

Phyllis  did  not  answer  his  question.  Her  eyes  were  quickly 
searching  the  broken  country  in  front  of  them,  as  if  in 
hopes  that  there  was  no  such  thing  as  a  river  in  this  dried-up 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  451 

dreadful  country.  There  could  be  no  river — it  was  impos- 
sible. 

A  glint  of  water  suddenly  caught  her  eyes;  and  as  the 
crowd  saw  it  too  their  confused  voices  swelled  to  a  savage 
roar.  The  bearers  of  the  cage  quickened  their  pace;  they 
were  now  proceeding  almost  at  a  run,  as  if  anxious  to  finish 
their  dread  work.  By  the  river,  perched  on  some  high 
ground,  stood  a  little  red  temple — broken,  dilapidated, 
tragic  in  aspect. 

Phyllis  suddenly  wrung  her  hands  and  sobbed  in  her  dis- 
tress; and  as  Kerr  saw  that  he  made  up  his  mind. 

"I  will  stop  them,"  he  said  curtly,  buttoning  his  coat,  "that 
is,  I  will  attempt  to  do  so.  But  you  must  go — you  will  have 
to  leave  me  alone.  It  will  not  be  very  pleasant." 

Phyllis  looked  at  him,  and  he  saw  the  tears  in  her  eyes. 

"How  will  you  do  it?"  she  whispered.  "You — one  man 
against  hundreds.  It  is  impossible — I  have  been  foolish. 
They  will  kill  you  too." 

"That  is  my  business,"  he  replied  abruptly.  "But  you 
must  leave  me.  I  am  going  on — to  see  if  it  can  be  done." 

Full  of  an  idea  that  had  sprung  up  within  him,  he  cantered 
sharply  ahead  so  as  to  arrive  at  the  river  first.  As  he  skirted 
the  edge  of  the  procession  and  passed  very  near  the  cage,  he 
saw  the  young  fellow  within  it — hitherto  stoically  indiffer- 
ent— suddenly  stiffen.  It  was  as  if  he  smelt  something  ahead. 
Kerr  noted  the  fact  with  appreciation.  Perhaps  he  would 
need  his  help — if  there  was  going  to  be  any  need  of  help  at 
all. 

Kerr  reached  the  banks  of  the  muddy  river  a  few  hundred 
yards  ahead  of  those  running  in  advance  of  the  main  body. 
Quickly  he  rode  here  and  there  over  the  broken  ground 
trying  to  see  what  he  should  do.  The  gates  of  the  little  red 
temple  had  been  thrown  open,  as  if  in  preparation  for  a 
ceremony.  Incense  was  smouldering  in  a  big  iron  urn  in 
front  of  the  gates:  evidently  there  would  be  a  temporary 
halt  made  here.  Well — and  then? 


452  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

He  clattered  into  the  dilapidated  courtyard  to  see.  There 
was  nobody  inside — not  a  soul.  He  glanced  at  the  walls. 
Though  discoloured  with  age  and  overgrown  with  weeds, 
by  a  miracle  they  were  quite  intact.  It  would  be  here  or 
never,  he  decided ;  and  so,  turning  bridle,  he  trotted  abruptly 
out  again  and  gained  the  highway. 

How  quickly  they  were  coming,  he  thought,  riding  down 
the  road  towards  them.  The  cage  was  a  little  like  that  black 
brass-bound  pump  which  had  been  borne  so  swiftly  and  so 
cruelly  along  on  the  day  of  the  fire  and  the  mobs  and  the 
savage  cavalry.  The  bearers,  speeding  along  at  the  native 
jog-trot,  were  doing  their  six  miles  an  hour  and  trying  to 
do  more.  Being  strong  countrymen,  they  were  going  much 
quicker  than  the  townsmen  who  had  carried  the  pump. 

He  noted  now  without  surprise  that  groups  of  wizened  old 
women,  some  supporting  themselves  with  long  staffs,  were 
standing  near  by  on  rising  ground,  shading  their  eyes  with 
their  hands  and  gazing  intently  in  the  direction  of  the 
oncoming  multitude.  The  country  had  seemed  a  desert ;  yet 
people  sprang  up  from  nowhere  in  particular,  called  to  life 
by  the  lust  of  death.  It  was  very  strange. 

A  little  in  doubt  as  to  whether  he  should  move  from 
where  he  now  was,  he  reined  in  with  a  jerk.  He  muttered 
to  himself  in  anger  as  he  saw  that  Phyllis  was  still  following. 
Her  slight  figure  in  her  black  habit  stood  out  clearly.  She 
was  on  the  flank  of  the  procession,  almost  opposite  to  the 
cage,  as  if  it  had  cast  a  spell  over  her — as  if  she  could  not 
leave  it.  The  girl  was  a  fool,  he  reflected  to  himself; 
she  did  not  begin  to  understand  what  it  would  be  like  when 
he  interfered.  He  began  to  ride  towards  her — and  then  as 
suddenly  stopped.  It  was  useless.  If  he  did  that,  his 
opportunity  would  be  lost.  There  would  possibly  be  just 
one  moment  when  vigorous  action  might  win  a  temporary 
advantage;  if  he  let  that  go  by,  they  would  rush  the  cage 
into  the  water  and  all  would  be  over. 

A  minute  or  two  went  by  before  the  leading  files  reached 
him.  Now,  as  if  he  had  only  come  to  witness  the  execution, 


THE  HUMAN  COBWEB  453 

purposely  he  rode  a  little  to  one  side,  and  allowed  the 
excited  multitude  to  sweep  along — uncontested  masters  of 
the  dusty  highway.  The  sharp  guttural  calls,  the  sweating 
faces,  the  glittering  eyeballs,  the  reek  of  passion  thrown  up  as 
they  passed — were  eloquent  of  the  volcano  which  would  be 
unloosed  on  him  as  soon  as  he  made  his  attempt.  He  felt 
once  more  that  he  was  a  sorry  fool — more  of  a  fool  than  ever 
since  now  he  understood.  Yet  he  had  said  that  he  would 
try  it,  and  therefore  he  was  going  to  do  so. 

Here  was  the  cage  at  last.  The  crowd,  denser  than  ever, 
and  now  frantic  with  excitement  as  the  ochre-coloured  river 
disclosed  its  sombre  aspect  to  their  eager  eyes,  was  impeding 
the  rapid  progress  of  the  cage.  The  bearers  shouted  for  a 
passage  to  be  left  them;  but  the  crowd  only  swayed  uneasily 
to  and  fro,  and  then  at  last  came  to  a  sudden  halt.  An  old 
man,  with  a  long  white  beard,  had  fallen  on  his  knees  in 
full  view  of  the  bearers  and  was  now  praying  and  supplicat- 
ing passionately.  He  knocked  his  head  on  the  ground  and 
raised  his  hands  to  the  heavens;  he  tore  his  clothing,  he 
beat  on  his  chest.  The  village  law  was  not  working  as 
smoothly  as  of  yore,  thought  Kerr  grimly,  as  he  moistened 
his  dry  lips  and  stiffened  himself  for  the  struggle. 

For  the  old  man  was  being  joined  by  others:  a  woman, 
whose  brown-yellow  face  was  almost  green  from  emotion, 
began  tearing  her  hair  and  dramatically  gesticulating  in  a 
frenzy  of  hysteria;  young  boys  crying  meaninglessly  fell 
down  beside  her.  The  crowd  was  not  of  one  opinion — there 
was  a  minority  which  demanded  a  hearing — he  thought  with 
sudden  exultation.  Would  they  help  him  actively? 

But  the  interruption  was  short-lived.  The  bearers,  as  if 
they  were  tired  of  the  wait,  forced  the  cage  forward  until 
it  was  almost  opposite  the  temple  doors.  The  moment  had 
come. 

Suddenly,  using  his  spurs  with  all  his  strength,  before 
any  one  had  realized  what  had  happened  Kerr  had  plunged 
his  maddened  pony  straight  through  the  crowd,  scattering 
and  trampling  all  aside  until  he  had  reached  the  cage. 


454  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

The  roar  which  instantly  went  up  apprised  him  that  his 
success  would  not  last  long.  He  did  not  care — now  that  he 
had  begun!  Thrashing  round  like  a  demon  with  his  whip, 
and  almost  unseating  himself  by  the  extravagance  of  his 
movements,  he  flogged  the  bearers  away;  the  cage  fell 
awkwardly  to  the  ground,  and  instantly  the  young  fellow 
within  had  flung  himself  madly  against  the  wooden  bars. 
Several  times  he  exerted  his  strength  in  vain — then  suddenly 
there  was  a  sharp  crack:  one  bar  gave,  then  another,  then 
another,  and  like  a  flash  the  fellow  was  through.  Instantly 
he  turned  and  pulled  the  swooning  woman  out  on  to  the 
ground.  A  hundred  hands  were  stretched  to  seize  them 
again.  Kerr  thrashed  and  rode  frantically  round  and  round, 
always  keeping  the  mob  at  bay — and  then,  rather  miracu- 
lously, he  found  that  they  were  inside  the  temple  gates,  with 
men  and  boys  on  their  heels  like  a  pack  of  wolves. 

"Quick,  quick!"  he  called  to  the  young  man,  trying  him- 
self to  swing  the  gate  to  without  dismounting,  and  still 
slashing  at  his  pursuers.  But  it  was  too  much  to  expect, 
and  his  heart  began  to  sink.  Then,  just  as  all  seemed  up, 
there  were  fresh  yells  and  a  partial  stampede,  and  leaping 
through  on  her  pony,  with  a  single  mafu  behind  her,  came 
Phyllis. 

"Get  back,  get  back!"  shouted  Kerr  madly,  yet  knowing  all 
the  while  that  it  was  impossible.  The  next  instant  Phyllis 
was  beside  him,  gasping  for  breath  and  white  with  emotion. 
Now  nerved  to  further  efforts,  he  tossed  himself  from  his 
pony  and  seized  the  gate.  His  mafu  joined  him — the  young 
countryman  aided.  There  was  a  sharp,  furious  struggle,  and 
then  a  crack,  like  a  slap.  The  mafu,  picking  up  a  brick,  had 
hurled  it  with  the  brutal  unconcern  of  the  East  straight  in 
the  face  of  the  nearest  man;  and  at  his  frantic  yell  and 
the  spurt  of  blood  which  followed  there  was  a  waver  of 
indecision — and  the  gate  was  shut. 

"Inside,  inside!"  shouted  Kerr  as  the  others  put  up  the 
bars  with  which  all  such  gates  are  furnished.  He  pulled 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  455 

Phyllis  from  her  pony,  and  then,  driving  the  animals  in 
front  of  him,  he  rushed  to  the  first  building. 

The  young  countryman  lingered  behind  gathering  handfuls 
of  stones.  He  had  already  hastily  stripped  himself  bare  to  the 
waist  to  show  that  he  would  make  a  hot  fight  for  it.  Now 
gesticulating  and  talking  quickly,  he  tried  to  make  the  woman 
who  was  his  fellow-victim  rise  from  the  ground.  She  was 
rocking  her  body  to  and  fro  and  moaning  like  a  dog — and 
seemed  deaf  to  everything. 

"Come  on,"  called  Kerr,  looking  back  and  waving  to  them. 
"Hurry  up,  hurry  up!" 

The  pair,  spurred  by  the  insistence  of  his  gestures,  though 
they  did  not  understand  his  words,  followed  at  last,  the 
young  man  hastily  sweeping  his  supply  of  stones  into  the  cot- 
ton coat  which  he  had  stripped  from  his  shoulders. 

It  was  high  time.  Blows  already  thundered  fiercely  on  the 
outer  gate,  and  a  shower  of  stones  and  clods  of  earth  now 
fell  around  the  little  party.  Furious  at  the  unexpected  frus- 
tration of  their  design,  the  crowd  thus  gave  warning  of  the 
summary  vengeance  they  would  soon  wreak  on  all.  In  a  con- 
fused group  the  five  refugees,  driving  the  ponies  before  them, 
ran  through  several  small  gates,  which  led  from  one  court- 
yard to  another,  until  they  had  reached  the  rear  of  the  tem- 
ple and  the  massive  main  building.  Here,  perforce,  they  came 
to  a  dead  stop. 

"Where's  my  other  man  gone  to?"  said  Kerr  to  Phyllis,  at 
last  able  to  ask  the  question  which  had  been  troubling  him. 

"I  sent  him  for  help,"  said  Phyllis.  "I  told  him  to  ride 
hard." 

"Help!"  interrupted  Kerr,  savagely  pulling  loose  bricks 
from  a  wall,  and  marvelling  at  the  same  time  at  the  girl's 
resourcefulness.  "We  will  get  no  help.  It  will  be  a  ques- 
tion of  holding  them  off  or  finis.  You  will  soon  see.  Why 
didn't  you  mind  me  and  go  away?  Look  out!" 

He  broke  off  and  ducked  his  head  as  a  shower  of  missiles 
passed  perilously  close  to  him.  The  crowd,  having  swarmed 


456  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

all  round  the  high  wall  and  being  still  held  at  bay  until  the 
gate  was  battered  in,  was  cooling  its  anger  in  the  manner 
natural  to  all  mobs.  The  shower  of  stones  increased  as  the 
little  party  made  their  way  into  the  main  building — a  pon- 
derous structure  with  a  massive  roof  which  had  withstood 
the  ravages  of  centuries.  The  ponies  were  driven  in  behind 
some  hideous  wooden  gods,  and  then  Kerr  began  rapidly  to 
investigate  the  entrance.  He  swung  the  worm-eaten  doors 
backwards  and  forwards  on  their  rusty  hinges,  only  to  find 
that  all  means  of  locking  them  had  long  disappeared. 

"A  pretty  hole,"  he  said  to  himself,  "a  very  pretty  hole." 

"What  is  it?"  exclaimed  Phyllis,  who  was  watching  him 
anxiously. 

"The  doors  won't  shut,"  he  said  briefly,  "and  they  are  wide 
enough  to  let  in  ten  men  abreast."  He  turned  and  looked  at 
her.  "Don't  stand  there.  Keep  out  of  range:  they  are  feel- 
ing for  us  with  their  stones.  Look  at  the  way  they  are  rat- 
tling now." 

Suddenly  he  clapped  his  hand  to  his  face  and  stood  stock- 
still  for  just  the  briefest  interval. 

"First  blood  on  our  side,"  he  said  in  a  low  voice,  allowing 
the  cut  below  his  ear  to  drip,  and  going  on  with  his  work. 

"Come  inside,  come  inside,"  urged  Phyllis  as  this  fusillade 
increased,  but  Kerr  shook  his  head.  Still,  he  became  more 
careful.  Several  men  had  climbed  trees  in  the  fields  near 
by.  These  were  now  shouting  directions  to  the  crowd,  who, 
learning  exactly  where  their  victims  had  taken  refuge,  were 
redoubling  their  efforts.  A  continuous  stream  of  heavy  clods 
of  earth,  lumps  of  stone,  and  broken  bricks  were  now  hurtled 
through  the  air  and  rattled  against  the  walls  and  latticed 
doors  of  the  building. 

"This  won't  last  long,"  said  Kerr,  explaining  to  his  two 
companions  quickly  by  words  and  gestures  what  he  wanted 
them  to  do.  They  would  leave  one  half  of  the  double  doors 
open,  and  through  the  other  half  they  would  have  to  try  and 
keep  the  crowd  at  bay.  The  two  men  could  throw  bricks  or 
anything  they  could  get  hold  of — he  meant  to  reserve  him- 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  457 

self  for  those  who  tried  to  come  to  close  quarters.  That  was 
about  the  only  plan  he  could  think  of. 

"See  if  there  is  anything  like  a  pole  lying  around,"  he  called 
to  Phyllis,  whilst  the  three  tried  to  jam  the  crazy  doors  into 
position.  It  was  hard  work,  they  found;  but  at  length,  by 
wedging  some  of  the  latticed  work  which  they  tore  down, 
they  succeeded  in  effectively  barricading  half  the  entrance. 
Kerr  breathed  more  freely,  whilst  the  other  two  men  went 
on  piling  up  bricks  and  stones,  preparatory  to  the  next  move. 

"Will  this  do?"  said  Phyllis,  suddenly  coming  up  out  o£ 
the  inner  gloom  and  dragging  a  piece  of  heavy  wood  along 
behind  her. 

Kerr  looked  at  it  doubtfully. 

"I  don't  know  whether  I  can  handle  it,"  he  said  at  length, 
taking  it  from  her  and  gripping  it  in  both  hands.  But  he  was 
a  strong  man,  and  so  with  an  effort  he  managed  to  raise  his 
proposed  weapon  above  his  head  and  whirl  it  like  a  flail.  "I 
may  just  be  able  to  do  it,  and  if  I  can,  somebody  will  be  badly 
hurt  anyway."  He  dropped  it  temporarily  and  turned  to  her, 
looking  for  a  moment  into  her  eyes.  "Now,"  he  concluded, 
"for  Heaven's  sake  obey  me  for  once  and  keep  out  of  sight." 
Then  he  went  on  with  his  work. 

The  outer  gates  took  a  good  deal  of  breaking  down,  it  ap- 
peared; for  some  minutes  more  elapsed  before  the  anxious 
listeners  heard  a  distant  roar  go  up.  Phyllis,  who  had  re- 
treated as  she  had  been  ordered,  became  very  pale,  but  other- 
wise she  gave  no  sign  of  her  secret  alarm.  It  had  been  her 
own  fault:  she  would  abide  by  whatever  results  might  come 
without  repining. 

"Now,"  called  Kerr  warningly  to  the  two  men  beside  him, 
bracing  himself  for  the  struggle,  "look  out  and  throw  hard." 
He  tried  not  to  think  of  what  might  happen  if  their  weak 
defence  broke  down. 

The  first  men  came  running  at  a  reckless  pace  into  this  in- 
ner courtyard  in  search  of  their  victims;  and  as  they  burst 
into  sight,  Kerr's  two  allies,  nerved  to  the  struggle  by  the 


458  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

grim  prospect  which  awaited  defeat,  sprang  out  and  began 
throwing  with  the  rapidity  of  despair.  They  shouted  as 
they  threw,  working  their  bodies  as  if  they  had  been  human 
catapults.  Never  pausing  for  an  instant,  up  and  down  they 
sawed  themselves  as  if  possessed — hurling,  hurling,  hurling. 

Fortunately  their  missiles  took  effect  almost  at  once.  Sev- 
eral men  were  badly  hit  and  commenced  crying  desperately 
as  they  lay  on  the  ground ;  and  the  others,  though  constantly 
reinforced,  began  dodging  and  at  length  running  back  until 
they  were  at  a  safe  distance.  As  if  satisfied  with  their 
prowess,  Kerr's  allies  instantly  stopped  throwing.  The  noisy, 
blue-coated  throng,  trembling  and  gesticulating  with  rage  but 
also  trembling  with  fear,  stood  irresolutely  there.  .  .  . 
The  first  rush  had  been  stayed. 

"Good  for  you,"  said  Kerr,  slapping  the  brown  back  of  the 
young  fellow  they  had  rescued,  and  wondering  what  was  now 
possessing  him.  For  his  hunted  look  had  suddenly  been  ex- 
changed for  one  of  fierce  joy.  His  quick  eyes  had  caught 
sight  of  the  heads  of  several  men  trying  to  swarm  over  the 
flanking  wall.  They  were  now  calling  to  him  in  hoarse 
staccato  shouts,  which  excited  him  still  further  and  made 
him  chatter  ceaselessly.  Kerr,  as  he  grasped  what  was  hap- 
pening, whistled  to  himself.  It  was  easy  to  guess  who  these 
newcomers  were — they  must  be  allies,  brothers  or  relations, 
who  were  willing  to  aid  the  revolt  against  village  law. 

Kerr  called  to  Phyllis.  Instantly  she  ran  forward  out  of 
the  gloom. 

"What  is  it?"  she  inquired  anxiously. 

"Things  are  brightening,"  he  said,  pointing  to  the  flanking 
wall ;  "we  will  have  more  to  say  than  I  thought.  The  prob- 
lem may  solve  itself." 

But  he  had  hardly  spoken  when  he  regretted  his  foolish 
confidence;  for  this  was  just  one  of  those  incidents  which 
serve  in  the  East  to  add  more  fuel  to  the  flames  than  ordi- 
nary resistance.  The  crowd,  once  again  pressing  irresistibly 
into  the  courtyard,  had  suddenly  understood  the  meaning  of 
this  coming  reinforcement;  and  now  with  cries  of  rage  they 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  459 

all  of  one  accord  rushed  on  the  men  as  they  dropped  to  the 
ground.  In  spite  of  the  shower  of  stones  and  bricks  which 
Kerr's  allies  sent  anew,  the  rush  continued,  and  soon  the 
courtyard  was  half  full  of  the  contesting  parties — fighting 
one  another  in  utter  indifference  to  their  prey — too  intent  on 
punishing  each  other  to  give  heed  to  any  other  feelings.  Yell- 
ing and  screaming,  pulling  and  hauling,  they  were  soon 
locked  in  inextricable  confusion,  which  rendered  all  assist- 
ance impossible.  It  was  as  if  demons  had  been  unloosed — 
demons  who  cared  for  nothing  but  Pandemonium. 

But  weight  of  numbers  told  in  the  end.  In  a  very  few 
minutes  all  the  traitors  to  the  village  cause  had  been  secured. 
Still  protesting  and  struggling,  and  trying  to  get  free,  they 
were  finally  dragged  out  of  the  courtyard  in  a  brutal  manner, 
leaving  it  free  for  the  main  play  to  be  continued.  Kerr 
gripped  his  piece  of  wood  once  more  and  stood  ready.  He 
foresaw  that  this  time  it  would  be  very  different  to  the  first 
halting  attempt.  The  villagers  had  hesitated  proceeding  to 
extremities,  hoping  perhaps  that  fear  would  cause  a  surren- 
der to  their  will.  They  had  been  disillusioned;  they  would 
lose  no  time  in  showing  that  they  meant  to  be  masters.  The 
only  thing  gained  by  the  interruption  had  been  a  few  minutes' 
grace. 

As  if  they  had  now  decided  on  their  proper  method  of  at- 
tack, without  any  warning  streams  of  men  began  suddenly 
running  swiftly  into  the  courtyard  through  the  narrow  gate- 
way. Separating  into  two*  parties,  they  quickly  reached  the 
main  building  where  it  touched  the  flanking  walls.  Now 
calling  to  others  to  come  on,  and  warding  off  with  their 
coats  the  missiles  madly  thrown  at  them,  of  one  accord  they 
rushed  at  the  main  door  where  the  defenders  were  stationed. 
It  had  come. 

Hardly  knowing  what  he  was  doing,  but  determined  not  to 
let  any  get  in  save  over  his  body,  Kerr  sprang  out  into  the 
open,  and  wielding  his  piece  of  timber  struck  fiercely  at  his 
assailants  as  they  pressed  forward,  never  ceasing  for  an  in- 
stant. There  were  some  frightful  cries ;  the  men  still  pressed 


460  THE   HUMAN  COBWEB 

in  closer;  he  felt  himself  hit  again  and  again;  but  conscious 
that  above  all  things  he  must  hold  the  entrance  intact,  and 
only  retreating  slowly  he  went  on  whirling  his  weapon  and 
madly  shouting  at  them  to  get  back. 

How  many  seconds  or  minutes  this  lasted,  he  never  knew; 
but  as  through  a  mist,  he  at  last  saw  the  brown  faces  and  the 
blue  clothing  sink  away  from  his  immediate  vicinity,  and  he 
allowed  his  aching  arms  a  moment's  repose.  He  noted  with- 
out emotion  that  his  mafu  was  lying  quite  silently  on  his 
face,  and  that  the  other  man,  panting  as  if  his  lungs  would 
burst,  was  streaked  with  unsightly  colouring.  It  had  been 
very  close.  The  next  rush  would  do  it. 

"Are  you  there?"  he  called  to  Phyllis  without  turning  his 
head,  and  wondering  why  his  voice  sounded  to  his  ears  so 
far  off.  He  was  surprised  to  hear  Phyllis  answer  from  just 
behind  his  back. 

"Look  here,"  he  gasped,  still  speaking  without  turning,  for 
the  crowd  was  preparing  to  come  on  again  and  he  dared  not 
take  his  eyes  off  them,  "the  pace  is  too  hot.  One  minute  more 
of  that  sort  of  work  and  they  will  do  me  up.  We  will  have 
to  do  what  I  didn't  want  to  do — to  shoot.  In  my  hip  pocket 
— put  your  hand — it's  only  a  thirty-eight  calibre — very  light 
to  pull.  When  they  come  on  again — blaze  on  the  ground — 
or  in  the  air.  Perhaps  that  will  be  enough." 

"Yes,"  said  Phyllis,  pulling  out  the  revolver.  He  noted 
with  satisfaction  that  her  voice  was  calm,  but  his  head  was 
hurting  him  and  it  was  a  trouble  to  think  in  the  roar  of  voices. 
He  wished  they  would  hurry  up 

He  had  begun  again  almost  without  noticing  it;  but  as  he 
swung  his  timber  up  and  the  storm  of  sound  filled  his  ears, 
as  the  men  dodged  in  and  out,  he  had  the  feeling  that  the 
comedy  had  been  played  out.  He  was  very  tired — only  he 
wished  that  Phyllis  had  not  been  there. 

Crack  from  behind  him  went  the  revolver,  and  then  crack 
again,  and  once  more  crack;  and  as  the  smoke  bit  his  nostrils 
there  were  tumultuous  shouts  and  a  wild  stampede.  A  great 
space  was  left  free  in  front  of  him — but  from  the  outskirts 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  461 

of  the  crowd  a  stone  was  hurled  which  struck  him  on  the 
arm,  then  another  hit  his  chest,  and  a  third  his  neck.  The 
timber  slid  from  his  hands,  and  he  walked  unsteadily  a  step 
or  two  backwards  until  he  could  lean  against  the  door-post. 
He  would  have  to  take  the  revolver  himself.  They  had  fin- 
ished him  up.  ... 

But  suddenly  men  commenced  running  into  the  courtyard 
again  with  an  amazed  shouting  and  crying  which  made  him 
mechanically  spring  forward,  though  he  had  nothing  now  in 
his  hands.  He  stood  gazing  foolishly  at  what  next  happened. 
For  instead  of  attacking  him  all  were  now  running  to  the 
flanking  walls  and  vainly  trying  to  assist  one  another  over. 

"Soldiers,  soldiers  have  come!"  called  Phyllis  wildly  be- 
hind him.  He  heard  her  voice  in  amazement,  and  then  he 
listened  with  all  his  ears.  There  was  the  ring  and  clash  of 
naked  steel.  There  was  the  call  of  voices.  There  was 
the  stamp  of  hoofs..  There  were  piteous  protests.  And  then, 
bending  low  so  as  to  get  through  the  narrow  courtyard  en- 
trance without  dismounting,  with  dozens  of  khaki-clad  cav- 
alrymen .crowding  behind  him,  suddenly  appeared  in  full  uni- 
form— Captain  Emm! 

Kerr,  who  had  picked  up  his  piece  of  timber  again,  let  it  fall 
to  the  ground  once  more  and  gasped  in  surprise.  Captain 
Emm! 

Captain  Emm,  still  calling  quick  orders,  now  came  across 
the  broad  stone  courtyard  at  a  trot,  leaving  his  men  to  secure 
everybody. 

"Hullo,  Kerr,"  he  said  unemotionally,  "not  much  hurt,  I 
hope?  Lucky  we  were  out  route  marching.  It  was  a  close 
call.  I  will  fix  you  up  in  a  minute." 

He  broke  off,  and  saluted  Phyllis  stiffly — Phyllis,  whose 
white  face  was  now  quivering  between  smiles  and  tears. 
Then  he  swung  himself  to  the  ground  and  threw  his  reins 
across  his  pony's  neck.  To  Peter  Kerr's  wondering  eyes  his 
every  movement  became  fraught  with  significance. 

"This  will  make  a  big  noise,"  commented  Captain  Emm  as 
he  examined  the  motionless  mafu,  whistling  to  himself  in  his 


462  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

wooden  way.  "The  man  is  all  right,  I  think,"  he  continued, 
"probably  only  badly  winded.  But  these  others" — he  broke 
off  and  pointed  to  several  prostrate  figures — "you  had  better 
give  me  a  full  account — I  will  try  and  fix  it  up  for  you — 
with  money." 

He  took  a  few  steps  forward  and  began  conferring  with 
some  of  his  men.  Kerr  seated  himself  on.  the  doorstep  and 
leaned  his  head  on  his  hand.  Though  he  was  very  sore  and 
dizzy  he  felt  strangely  happy — happy  in  a  way  which  he 
could  not  explain. 

"Never  mind,  never  mind,"  he  protested  to  Phyllis,  who 
wished  to  bandage  his  cuts,  "that  can  wait." 

"I  think  I  can  fix  it,"  said  Captain  Emm  monotonously  as 
he  came  up,  "if  you  do  not  mind  paying — paying  a  good  deal. 
But  the  affair  will  make  a  big  noise — oh,  yes,  a  big  noise." 
And  Captain  Emm,  being  discreet,  said  nothing  further,  but 
only  nodded  his  head  very  thoughtfully,  and  he  went  on  with 
his  investigations. 


CHAPTER  VII 

"Dans  1'opinion  du  monde  le  mariage,  comme 
dans  la  comedie,  finit  tout.  C'est  precisement  le 
contraire  qui  est  vrai:  il  commence  tout." 

MME.  SWETCHINE. 

THE  affair  did  make  a  big  noise,  as  Captain  Emm  had  said 
it  would;  for  it  came  at  an  excitable  moment,  when  people 
were  still  half  expecting — though  they  said  all  was  over — 
sparks  to  fire  the  powder-magazine  and  blow  them  to  smith- 
ereens. 

However,  as  on  this  occasion  there  had  been  no  gossips 
present  to  give  romantic  versions,  and  as  the  principal  actors 
remained  discreetly  silent,  the  incident  was  soon  merely  set 
down  as  the  usual  anti-foreign  outbreak.  Poor  Chinese — 
they  always  get  the  blame,  no  matter  how  little  they  may 
be  responsible!  They  are  always  condemned,  and  then 
hanged,  drawn,  and  quartered  because  they  are — Chinese! 

People  indeed  congratulated  themselves  that  they  had  de- 
tachments of  sailors  to  guard  their  Legation  walls;  for  if 
such  an  incident  as  this  took  place  in  the  country,  what  might 
not  occur  in  the  town!  What  indeed!  There  was  even 
some  talk  of  asking  for  reinforcements — though  the  line  of 
argument  pursued  by  the  alarmists  was  more  than  usually  ab- 
surd, and  the  more  sensible  soon  laughed  them  out  of  coun- 
tenance. Mrs.  May  wept  over  Phyllis  for  one  whole  day, 
and  refused  to  let  her  go  out  until  she  had  been  assured  a 
hundred  times  that  the  city  was  absolutely  quiet,  and  that 
nothing  need  really  be  apprehended  from  the  affair.  Yet, 
totally  unconvinced,  she  was  ready  to  believe  the  alarmists 
and  set  China  as  a  horrid  land,  where  the  most  terrible  things 
naturally  occur,  forgetting  that  all  countries  in  the  world  are 
more  or  less  the  same,  the  main  difference  being  the  point  of 
view  and  nothing  else. 


464  THE    HUMAN    COBWEB 

As  for  Kerr,  he  wrote  the  next  morning  to  inquire  very  civ- 
illy after  Phyllis,  saying  nothing  at  all  about  himself  save 
that  he  would  call  in  the  afternoon  if  the  ladies  did  not  mind 
seeing  an  absurdly  bandaged  head.  But  in  the  afternoon, 
when  Phyllis  was  waiting  anxiously  for  his  arrival,  came  an- 
other note — written  in  pencil  this  time — saying  that  it  seemed 
that  he  had  a  sharp  touch  of  fever  and  consequently  did  not 
feel  much  like  moving.  And  the  next  day  Phyllis  heard  with 
renewed  alarm  that  he  was  no  better,  but  even  a  little  in- 
coherent, which  was  not  strange,  since  his  head  had  been 
somewhat  badly  battered.  Still,  though  he  could  not  write, 
there  was  nothing  to  be  alarmed  at,  she  was  assured  by  others. 
And  thus  it  happened  that  it  was  not  until  four  or  five  days 
later  that  she  saw  his  handwriting  once  more. 

The  period  of  waiting  had  been  excellent,  it  may  be  in- 
ferred, for  her  state  of  mind;  for  when  she  had  read  his 
latest  note  the  colour  was  in  her  cheeks,  her  eyes  unusually 
bright,  and  her  bad  temper  banished  most  completely. 

"Mother,"  she  said,  rushing  into  her  room,  "Mr.  Kerr  is 
much  better ;  but  as  the  doctor  has  told  him  to  stay  quiet  for 
a  few  days  longer,  he  wants  to  know  whether  we  will  go 
round  to  the  hotel  and  have  tea  with  him  this  afternoon. 
Can  I  say  yes?" 

"Of  course,  Phyllis  dear,"  said  Mrs.  May,  who  had  se- 
cretly become  very  anxious  to  hear  from  Peter  Kerr's  lips 
the  real  story  of  their  startling  adventure.  Phyllis  had  been 
most  uncommonly  discreet,  and  Mrs.  May  for  the  life  of 
her  could  not  understand  her  account,  which  was  somewhat 
contradictory  all  the  way  through,  and  specially  contradic- 
tory in  certain  critical  parts.  So  for  different  reasons  both 
counted  the  hours  until  the  afternoon  had  come. 

"What  a  funny  little  hotel,"  said  Phyllis  as  they  at  last 
stopped  in  front  of  the  dusty  little  caravansary  which  had 
been  the  scene  of  so  many  happenings.  They  had  often 
passed  it  by,  but  had  never  gone  in  before. 

"It  does  not  look  like  the  ordinary  hotel,"  replied  Mrs. 
May,  wondering  whether  it  was  quite  safe. 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  465 

They  went  into  the  barren  little  hall,  to  be  greeted  by  Car- 
not,  who  rushed  from  his  office  in  frantic  haste. 

"I  beg  your  pardon,  Madame,  Mademoiselle,"  he  ex- 
claimed, swinging  his  head  first  to  one  and  then  to  the  other 
in  his  curiously  friendly  manner.  "I  should  have  been  at  the 
door  waiting  for  you.  Mr.  Kerr  expressly  told  me  to  do  so 
— but  I  was  called  away.  I  trust  you  will  pardon  me." 

Phyllis  and  her  mother  exchanged  amused  looks  as  the  Swiss 
led  the  way  upstairs.  They  could  not  imagine  who  this  tall 
man  with  the  gaunt  face  was  and  why  he  seemed  so  con- 
cerned. He  had  the  most  easy  manners  in  the  world — in 
fact,  he  was  frankly  familiar ;  yet  there  was  something  about 
him — something  sympathetic — which  pleased  them. 

"The  last  step  is  the  dangerous  step,"  he  warned  them 
cheerily,  turning  as  he  reached  the  landing.  "I  have  been 
too  busy  to  have  it  repaired — that  is  to  say,  my  business  has 
been  too  slack  to  allow  me  to  be  busy — which  is  the  same 
thing!" 

Once  more  the  two  glanced  at  each  other.  So  this  was  Car- 
not,  about  whom  they  remembered  hearing. 

He  knocked  at  a  door  and  instantly  threw  it  open.  Mrs. 
May  and  Phyllis  went  in,  and  he  followed. 

"Mr.  Kerr,"  he  called,  "the  ladies  have  come  and  I  am  go- 
ing." And  with  that  he  disappeared. 

"Don't  move,  please,"  said  Mrs.  May,  hastening  to  the  cane 
long-chair  on  which  Peter  Kerr  was  lying. 

Kerr,  however,  tilted  himself  up  quickly  to  a  sitting  posi- 
tion. 

"Good-afternoon,"  he  said.  "I  must  really  apologize  for 
being  so  stupidly  weak." 

"How  are  you  to-day?"  said  Mrs.  May. 

"I  am  really  quite  well,"  said  Kerr,  smiling  and  looking  at 
Phyllis.  "It  is  only  the  wretched  doctor's  fault  that  I  am 
tied  to  this  chair.  I  feel  just  the  same  as  usual." 

"You  are  looking  a  little  pale,  all  the  same,"  commented 
Phyllis*  who  had  been  studying  him  carefully. 


466  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

"It's  the  absurd  black  bandage  that  does  that,"  he  objected, 
putting  his  hand  to  his  head. 

"Did  you  have  to  have  much  stitched?"  inquired  Mrs.  May, 
a  little  as  if  she  were  speaking  of  sewing  clothes. 

Phyllis  laughed  nervously. 

"How  absurd  you  are,  mother,"  she  said.  "Of  course  he 
had.  There  was  a  place  above  his  temple  that  was  horrid. 
I  wonder  that  he  wasn't  stunned.  I  remember  a  girl  at 
school  who  fell  down  and  cut  herself  like  that  and  who  was 
ill  for  a  month." 

Involuntarily  Kerr  started  a  little.  Phyllis  had  conjured  up 
a  picture  of  the  past  which  was  curiously  disconcerting  to 
him. 

"A  woman,"  he  said,  a  little  irrelevantly,  "is  different  from 
a  man."  Then  once  again  his  mouth  twitched  ever  so  little; 

"Does  it  sting  when  you  move?"  said  Phyllis  anxiously, 
her  quick  eyes  having  noted  the  movement. 

"Yes,"  said  Peter,  still  thinking  in  spite  of  himself. 

"Well,  lie  quiet  and  don't  bother.  We  will  attend  to  the 
tea." 

There  was  a  little  silence  whilst  servants  entered  and  set  a 
table. 

"It  was  awfully  good  of  you  to  come,"  remarked  Kerr  more 
easily  a  few  minutes  later,  when  they  were  more  settled. 

"I  want  you  to  tell  me  all  about  your  adventure,  Mr. 
Kerr,"  said  Mrs.  May,  "if  you  feel  like  it.  Phyllis  has  re- 
ferred me  to  you  for  the  complete  story.  She  says  now  that 
she  does  not  remember  how  it  all  happened,  save  that  you 
got  mixed  up  irf  an  angry  crowd  and  had  to  defend  your- 
selves." 

"Not  to-day,  mother,"  interrupted  Phyllis  hastily,  looking 
at  Peter  Kerr  meaningly.  "I  am  sure  he  doesn't  feel  like  it 
yet." 

"Perhaps  not  to-day,"  agreed  Peter  Kerr,  wondering  how 
much  Phyllis  had  said.  "For  you  see  it's  rather  really  a  long 
story." 

"Yes,  it's  a  very  long  story,"  echoed  Phyllis. 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  467 

Mrs.  May  looked  a  little  disappointed,  but  did  not  insist. 

"It  must  have  been  awful,"  she  said,  "and  I  wonder  you 
did  not  fare  worse  than  you  did.  You  have  settled  yourself 
very  comfortably,"  she  continued,  looking  round  the  room, 
"and  what  lovely  flowers  you  have  on  the  verandah." 

"They  are  nothing  much,"  said  Kerr,  watching  her  diplo- 
matically go  out  to  investigate  them  more  closely. 

"Are  you  really  all  right?"  inquired  Phyllis,  now  that  they 
were  alone  at  last. 

Kerr  smiled  at  her.  There  was  a  new-born  confidence  in 
his  manner. 

"Quite  all  right,"  he  said;  "feel  my  head:  it  is  cool  as  a 
cucumber." 

Phyllis  took  a  step  or  two  nearer  and  placed  her  hand  on 
the  bandage. 

"You  can't  feel  through  silk,"  objected  Kerr,  looking  into 
her  eyes. 

''You  are  an  impostor,"  murmured  Phyllis,  allowing  her 
hand  to  stray  below  the  bandage  for  an  instant.  Once  more 
her  eyes  were  bright,  her  cheeks  flushed,  her  red  lips  trem- 
bled— just  as  they  had  been  on  a  memorable  occasion  many 
months  before.  How  much  had  happened  since  then ! 

"What  a  little  hand  you  have  got,"  said  Peter  Kerr,  seiz- 
ing it. 

"What  a  wretched  bandage  you  have  made,"  said  Phyllis, 
refusing  to  look  into  his  eyes.  "Where  did  you  learn  to  tie 
bandages?" 

For  the  second  time  Peter  Kerr's  expression  changed  in  a 
curious  manner. 

"Am  I  hurting  you?"  inquired  Phyllis  anxiously.  Her  rin- 
gers, which  had  been  busy  untying  the  knot,  paused  in  their 
labours  for  an  instant  whilst  she  looked  at  him. 

"Not  much,"  he  replied,  thinking  hard  and  yet  trying  not 
to  think. 

When  she  had  finished  re-tying  the  bandage  he  had  recov- 
ered himself  entirely.  Suddenly  he  took  both  her  hands  in 
his ;  for  at  last  he  had  fully  made  up  his  mind. 


468  THE   HUMAN   COBWEB 

"Have  you  forgiven  me?"  he  inquired  gravely. 

"For  being  quixotic  the  other  day  and  rushing  in  after  the 
reputed  manner  of  fools?  Frankly,  I  don't  know.  I  shall 
have  to  think." 

She  laughed  at  the  way  she  baffled  him,  for  now  she  felt 
that  she  could  afford  to  trifle. 

"Why  do  you  always  laugh?"  objected  the  man  a  trifle  mo- 
rosely, because  he  had  not  woman's  great  good  sense. 

It  was  her  turn  to  become  grave. 

"The  art  of  laughing,"  she  announced  grandiloquently,  "is 
acquired  to  save  one  from  the  pain  of  crying." 

"Oh,  how  wise !  If  you  only  could  understand  how  things 
have  been,"  he  sighed,  looking  away. 

Phyllis  hesitated  a  moment.  Was  that  her  mother's  foot- 
step coming  along  the  verandah? 

"Perhaps  I  do  understand,"  she  said  gently. 

At  once  he  turned,  and  the  colour  stained  his  face. 

"You  understand?"  he  ejaculated,  looking  at  her  in  amaze- 
ment. 

She  nodded  ever  so  slightly. 

"Phyllis,"  he  said,  "do  you  think  you  could  ever  love  me?" 

"A  man,"  she  answered,  disengaging  her  hands,  "should 
never  be  humoured." 

"The  old  heresy,"  he  murmured  as  Mrs.  May  appeared  at 
the  window.  Phyllis  drew  a  little  away. 

"What  a  pity  we  are  going  so  soon,"  said  Mrs.  May,  paus- 
ing at  the  window  and  looking  back  at  the  vast  pile  of  the 
great  central  Tartar  gate.  "I  think  I  could  get  over  being 
so  afraid  in  time.  There  are  wonderful  views  even  from 
this  verandah.  What  a  pity  we  are  going,  Phyllis." 

Peter  Kerr  looked  at  Phyllis :  she  nodded. 

"Phyllis,"  he  said,  speaking  her  name  softly,  "is  not  going 
away — at  least,  not  just  yet." 

Mrs.  May  came  forward  quickly.  Her  hands  were  twitch- 
ing nervously — the  tears  almost  in  her  eyes. 

"Phyllis!"  she  exclaimed,  with  a  world  of  meaning  com- 
pressed into  that  one  word. 


THE   HUMAN   COBWEB  469 

Phjdlis  laughed  softly  and  allowed  Peter  Kerr  to  take  her 
hand.  They  formed  a  suggestive  picture — the  wounded  man 
— the  wholesome  maid. 

"Yes,  mother/'  she  replied,  with  her  eyes  very  bright  and 
her  colour  coming  and  going,  "it  is  true.  I  have  not  got  it 
in  my  heart  to  leave  the  poor  man  alone  with  his  schemes 
now  that  he  has  hurt  himself.  And  so  you  see  I  shall  have 
to  stay." 


NIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA  LIBRARY 


THIS  BOOK  IS  DUE  ON  THE  LAST  DATE 
STAMPED  BELOW 


f£B  19 


MAR    9  1918 
MAR  10  ittd 
JUL    9  1919 


•JUN  5    I92Q 


J&  4,®> 

JAN   %&  1921 


.      8 

RPft  2    ! 


7  -I 


4 


RECEIVED 

SEP  0  b  1996 

CIRCULATION  DEPT. 

MAY  0  9  2006 


30m-6,'14 


O 


/ 


257410 


*       *' 


U.  C.  BERKELEY  LIBRARIES 


